The lives of the popes in the early middle ages

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Pope vE oer chit PORES
VOL, L—PARTeH,

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pOTO’
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dy
LIVES OF THE POPES

IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES

BY THE

REV. HORACE _K. MANN

‘*De gente Anglorum, qui maxime familiares Apostolicee Sedis semper
existunt” (Gesta Abb, Fontanel. A.D. 747-752, ap. M.G. SS. II. 289).

HEAD MASTER OF ST. CUTHBERT’S GRAMMAR SCHOOL, NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE ~

VOL. I. (in Two Parts)
THE POPES UNDER THE LOMBARD RULE

St. Grecory I. (tHE Great) To Leo III.
599-795

PART II.—657-795

SECOND EDITION

LONDON
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., LTD.
Sr. Louis, Mo.: B. HERDER BOOK CO.
1925

Theology Library

SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY
AT CLAREMONT
Califownia

Printed in Great Pritain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London

To

J. F. WEIDNER, Esa, J.P,

COUNCILLOR OF THE CITY OF NEWCASTLE-ON- TYNE,
BY WHOSE KIND ASSISTANCE IT WAS PUBLISHED,

THIS VOLUME

35 gtatetullp Dedicated

BY

THE AUTHOR.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

ee

VITALIAN (657-672), . : ; : : .
ADEODATUS (672-676), :

Donus (676-678),

St. AGaTHO (678-681),

St. Leo II. (682-683), :

St. Benepicr IT. (684-685),

Joun V. (685-686),

Conon (686-687),

St. Sercrus I. (687-701),

Joun VI. (701-705),

Joun VII. (705-707), .

SISINNIUS (708),

CoNSTANTINE (708-715),

St. Grecory II. (715-731),

St. Grecory III. (731-741),

St. ZACHARY (741-752), ;
STEPHEN II. (752) and StepuHen III. (752-757),
ST. PAUL I. (757-767),

STEPHEN (III.) IV. (763-772),

Hanprian I. (772-795),

AppENDIx—The two letters of Gregory II. to Leo III, .

INDEX, . .

PAGE

17
20
23
49
54
64
68
77
105

109

A LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS
USED IN THIS VOLUME.

Jaffe, or Regesta . . = Regesta Pontificum Romanorum, ed.
Jaffe, 2nd ed., Lipsiz, 1885.
Labbe . : é . = Sacrosancta Concilia, ed. Labbe

and Cossart, Paris, 1671.
L. P., Anastasius, or met = Liber Pontificalts, 2 vols., ed. L.
Book of the Popes Duchesne, Paris, 1886.
M. G. H., or Pertz . = Monumenta Germania Historica,
either Scriptores (M.G.SS.) or
LE pistole (M. G. Epp.).

ed Ba , : . = Patrologie Grecque, ed. Migne.

Bola. : ‘ . = Lfatrologie Latine, ed. Migne.

Sao IESE = Rerum Ltalicarum Scriptores, ed.
Muratori.

The sign t+ placed before a date indicates that the date in
question is the year of the death of the person after whose name
the sign and the date are placed.

VITALIAN.

A.D), 657-672,

———)9—_—

Sources—The Z. P. Some half dozen letters of the Pope, to
be found in the ‘Councils,’ ¢.g., Mansi, x., and Migne, P. Z.,
BAO 7.

The history of Vitalian’s relations with England will be found
in Bede, H £., iii. and iv., etc.

Incidental notices of this Pope occur in Paul the Deacon,
Theophanes, the Acts of the Sixth General Council, etc.

EMPERORS OF THE KINGS OF THE EXARCHS OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Constans IJ., 642-668. Aripert I., 653-661. Theodore Calliopas,
Constantine IV.(or V.) Perctarit and Gode- 653-664.
(Pogonatus), 668-685. pert, 661-662. Gregory, 664-677.
Grimwald, 662-671.
Perctarit (second time),
672-688.

IN the first part of this volume we traced the careers of Intro-
the popes through the first half of the seventh century. pe
Of this century, through the dearth of records, very little

is known in either East or West. It is a century which, while

for this reason to us now dull and dark all over the civilised
VOL, ky PL. it, I

Compara-
tively
little
known of
this Pope.

2 VITALIAN

world, was in the West, politically speaking, uneventful,
monotonous and quiet, and in the East violent and
perturbed. For the Orient was agitated by the heresy of
Monothelism and the sword of the Saracen. In the West
it was the darkness of the mist, in the East the blackness”
of the storm.

This second part of the volume will see the dulness of
the seventh century give place somewhat before the
coming of the great popes of the eighth century and
the dawn of the age of Charlemagne. It will see Mono-
thelism swept into oblivion, the disappearance of the last
shreds of the Zhree Chapters, the rise and fall of Icono-
clasm ; it will witness the expanse and collapse of the
Lombard power in Italy; it will contemplate the definite
passing of ‘Roman’ power in the peninsula from the
nerveless fingers of the exarch, whence it had long been
slipping, into the hands of the Sovereign Pontiffs; and it
will view with satisfaction the consequent strengthening of
the position of those who, with lasting honour to themselves,
and with enduring benefit to the nations, were to take the
proud position of Head of the Christian Commonwealth of
the Medieval States of Europe.

Considering the fact that Vitalian reigned for fourteen
years and a half, we know but little of his doings ;

1 For from the social and religious work, which was being accom-
plished in the West in this quiet age, by the bishops, and especially
by the monks of St. Benedict, it was anything but uneventful.
Hence, from the number of saintly workers it produced, this age is
called by the great Benedictine of St. Maur, Mabillon, ‘ the golden age?
For of the monks of St. Benedict in particular maybe said what the
great African Tertullian said of Christians in general: “In compari-
son with the catastrophes of former ages, those which happen now are
less serious. For from the time when the world received Christians
from God, their innocence has tempered the wickedness of the world,
and there began to be those who could intercede for us with God.”
Lib. Apol.,c. 40. Cf. Pitra, S, Léger, introduc., p. vil. f.

VITALIAN, 3

absolutely nothing, for instance, of the first six years of
his pontificate. Of what we do know, however, it is
interesting to Englishmen to discover that a considerable
portion has reference to this country. And to him we owe
a debt of gratitude for having sent us one of the greatest
men that have adorned the Church in this country—the
Greek Theodore.

The son of one Anastasius, a name, it will be observed, a
constantly recurring in the history of the Church at ie yee
this period, Vitalian was born at Segni, a town of the
Campagna, on the ‘Latin Road, at the thirtieth milestone
from the city, picturesquely situated on a height, and, as
remains show, once possessed of extensive and massive
fortifications, This town is also famous in history for
having resisted the Volscians of old, and as the birthplace
of that centre figure of the Middle Ages, Innocent ITI.

Vitalian’s first act as Pope was to send his nuncios to Conse-
Constantinople as bearers of his synodical letter ‘to the Bishop of
most pious princes, for Constantine was now a partner in 30, oe
the empire, to notify his consecration,! and to proclaim his
faith. And we learn from the acts of the thirteenth session
of the Sixth General Council that the Pope also wrote to
the patriarch Peter to exhort him to return to the orthodox
faith. The results of these letters were, on the part of the Letters te
emperor, a present for St. Peter in the shape of a copy of acs
the gospels written in letters of gold, and with its binding emperor
all adorned with fine jewels of exceptional size ; and on the pata
part of the patriarch a letter to the Pope, Beeannine: “The ee
letter of your fraternity has given us spiritual joy.” The
Fathers of the Sixth Council found * that the passages of the

wish:

2 Act, 13, ap. Labbe, vi. None of these letters are extant. This
letter was evidently of the same obscure nature as the one he sent to
Pope Eugenius, and seemed to inculcate three wills. For Pope Agatho
(Ep. ad Const.) twice speaks of Peter sending a letter to Pope Vitalian

Synodical
letter of
Thomas
iit,

patr. of
Constan-
tinople.

4 VITALIAN

ancient writers quoted by Peter in this letter in support of
his doctrine of the One Will had been strangely mutilated.
It is very hard to understand this change of front towards
the See of Rome on the part of Constans. Whether it was
that his son Constantine had any influence over him; that
he was overawed by the determined stand of the Pope and
his legates, who, we are informed,! reasserted the privileges
of the Church ; or whether it was that, in view of the expe-
dition he made later on against the Lombards in Italy, he
thought it advisable to make a friend of the Pope, we do
not know. Of one thing, against certain writers, we are
certain, and that is that there was no truckling to Constans
on the part of the Pope in the matter of Monothelism,
though his letter may have been conceived in a very con-
ciliatory tone. This we may conclude on both positive and
negative grounds; from the firmness of his administration,”
and from the fact that, despite the real or pretended
opposition of Constantine Pogonatus, the name of Pope
Vitalian was at length struck? off the diptychs of the
Church of Constantinople; and that, too, though no
Pope’s name but his own had been inserted in them from
Honorius to the Sixth General Council under Pope Agatho.
The attitude of the Pope on the One Will question may
also be gathered from the fact that the orthodox patriarch,

teaching “et unam, et duas voluntates et operationes in dispensatione
incarnationis J. C.”

1 LZ. P.: “Renovantes privilegia Ecclesize.” Muratori (Aznail., ad
an. 657) refers these words to the Emperor Constans, ‘“‘ confermd (impera-
tore) i privilegi alla santa chiesa Romana.” The sense we have given
them is rather tentative than usual.

_ 7? Jo. “Hic regulam ecclesiasticam atque vigorem, ut mos erat,
omnimodo conservavit.”

3 Cf. the letter of Const. to Pope Donus (ap. Labbe, vi.), in which he
says he resisted for some time the demands that Vitalian’s name should
be struck off the diptychs, with the words of George, patriarch of
Constant., praying that the name might be rednserted! The diptychs
were registers of deceased Catholic bishops.

VITALIAN 5

Thomas II., who succeeded Peter in 667, at once en-
deavoured to put himself in communication with Vitalian.
The synodical letter he wrote to the Pope, which the
Fathers of the Sixth General Council pronounced quite
sound on the matter of the two wills,! never got despatched
to Rome owing to the troubles caused by the Saracens.
Two more orthodox prelates (John V., 669-674, and Con-
stantine I., 674-676) succeeded Thomas. John inserted
Vitalian’s name in the diptychs, and Theodore IJ. (676-678)»
a Monothelite, succeeded in getting the name removed.

We do not hear of Vitalian again till the approach of Visit of
Constans to Rome. In the year 662 Constans, for some Ou
reason, determined to transfer the seat of empire from a
Constantinople to Rome.? His main object may have
been a wish to recover Italy from the grasp of the
Lombards, but Theophanes avers, and @ priort reasons
would render likely, it was unpopularity at home that caused
Constans to make the attempt to divert ill-feeling from
himself, by concentrating public attention on enemies
abroad. His unpopularity was caused, says the chronicler,
by the murder of his brother Theodosius (¢. 660) and his
treatment of Pope Martin, St. Maximus and ‘many other
orthodox men, who would not approve of his heresy.
Landed in Italy, he soon found he was no match in arms
for Grimwald and his Lombards. He fell back on Rome,
and, as “he could do nothing against the Lombards, he
raged against the defenceless Romans.”* However, as
far as his relations with the Pope were concerned, Constans

1 Cf. the letter of Const. to Pope Donus (ap. Labbe, vi.).
2 Theoph., Chron., ad ann. 653,660. Cf. Bury, Later Roman Empire,

ii. 297-£.
3 Paulus Diac., v. 6 seg.
4 7.,c. 11. “Cum nihil se contra Langobardos gessisse conspiceret

(Constans) omnes seevitize suze minas contra suos, hoc est Romanos,
retorsit,”

6 VITALIAN

was amicable enough. On receiving news of his approach,
the Pope and clergy went out (June 5, 663) to the sixth
milestone on the Appian Way to meet him. For twelve
days the emperor remained in Rome, making offerings! to
the various churches, and living apparently on the best
terms with the Pope. On his side Vitalian, either making
a virtue of necessity, or because he believed that a mild
answer turns away wrath, showed no hostility to the
emperor. If Constans was considerate to the Pope, he
was not so to Rome. He carried off? all the bronze
ornaments of the city, and even stripped the Church of
Our Lady ‘ad Martyres,’ or the Pantheon, of its gilt bronze
tiles! With this plunder, this protector of his people
withdrew to Naples, and thence in the same year (663) to
Constans Sicily. Here for four years he did nothing but wring
over into. taxes® from the people of Sicily, Calabria, Africa and
sae Sardinia, rob the very churches of their sacred vessels,
and sell the people into slavery for money; so that well
might the chronicler add that life was not worth having.
His death, Like so many other persecutors of the Church, he died a
violent death, being assassinated * in a bath (July 15, 668),
At his death the army and the officials (judzces) in Sicily
Abortive elected an emperor of their own, one Mizizius or Mecetius.

Mone. f And now we cannot but read with surprise that the Pope

oe used ® his influence with considerable vigour in helping to

te ce
2 “Omnia que erant in ere ad ornatum civitatis deposuit,” etc. (2d.).
Cf. Paulus D., v. 11.
3 Concerning which Bede (De sex etat. ad an. 671) says they were
‘unparalleled’ ; and Paul the Deacon and the Z. P.: “ quales a szeculo
numquam fuerant.”
4 Theoph. in Chron. and the above eens
5 That Constantine was indebted to Vitalian in no small degree for
the successful termination of this rebellion we have on the very best
authority, viz., from Constantine himself in a letter which he wrote to
Pope Donus (ap. Labbe, vi., or ap. Migne, t. 87, p. 1152, P. Z.), in

VITALIAN 7

put down the rebellion. Troops poured into Sicily from
Italy, Africa, etc., and when the young Constantine arrived
from Constantinople, he found that the usurper was no
more. When he had returned to Constantinople, the
Saracens made a descent upon Sicily (669), and captured
Syracuse, and with it the plunder Constans had taken!
from Rome. So little does property sacrilegiously acquired
ever permanently profit its dishonest possessors,

We must now retrace our steps to the year 664. The Vitalian
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells? how Peada, the first Christian Fagland.

: : : : : : Th =
king of the Mercians, and Oswin, King of Northumbria, Bae

“came together and agreed that they would rear rig
monastery to the glory of Christ and the honour of $4 +
St. ,Peter. And they did so, and named. it ‘Mede-
shampstede’ (Peterborough), .... and committed it to a
monk who was called Saxewulf.” Wulfhere, the brother
and successor of Peada, resolved, with the advice of the
Archbishop of Canterbury, Deusdedit, and “ by the counsel
of all his ‘witan, both clergy and laity,” to finish the
work begun by his brother and to endow the monastery.
“And he did so.” And after the monastery had been
blessed by the archbishop, in presence of the king and
all his bishops and nobles, the king declared: “And thus
free 1 will make this minster that it be subject to Rome
alone.” Wulfhere understood well enough what so many,

which he speaks of the “collata nobis charitas ab Vitaliano, dum
superesset, in motione tyrannorum nostrorum.”

1 Vid. Paul. Diac., Hist. L., v.12, 13 ; Theoph. in Chron., ad an. 660 ;
L. P. in Vit. ‘Adeodat’; Amari, Storia det Mussilmani‘in Sicilia, i.
84 n., has found an interesting detail of this raid in an Arab chronicle
of the ninth century, from which it appears that India was then a good
market for valuable objects.

2 Ad ann. 655, 657. We use the translation of the Protestant editors
of the series of Zhe Church Historians of England. Cf. Bede, iv. 6.
For what is to be said on the spuriousness of these documents see
Haddan and Stubbs, Cozunczls, iii. 100 n., d.

‘8 VITALIAN

even Catholic bishops, have to their own cost often
enough failed to understand, viz., that a Church is then
most free when it is most subject to the See of Rome;
and, of course, the less subject to the See of Rome the
less free, the more the slave and creature of the State.
But Wulfhere was anxious for his ‘soul’s redemption,
and he prayed that “the heavenly gate-ward (viz. St.
Peter) would take in heaven from the man who took
from his gift and the gifts of other good men”; and
he confirmed the charters granting all the presents
and privileges to the monastery (A.D. 664), “I, King
Wulfhere, with the kings and earls and dukes and
thanes, the witnesses of my gift, do confirm it, before the
Archbishop Deusdedit, with the Cross of Christ.” “When,”
adds the chronicler, “these things were done, the king
sent to Rome to Vitalian, who then was Pope, and desired
that he should grant by his writing and with his blessing
all the before-mentioned things.” The wished-for bull was
granted, the Pope praying that St. Peter would exter-
minate with his sword or open with his keys the gates of
heaven, according as what he decreed was contravened or
obeyed. ;

Later on the monastery was destroyed by the Danes, and
we are told by the Saxon Chronicle (ann. 963) that when
its site was visited by Athelwold, Bishop of Winchester,
“he found nothing there but old walls and wild woods.
There found he, hidden in the old walls, writings that
Abbot Headda had erewhile written, how King Wulfhere
and Athefred his brother had built it, and how they had
freed it against king and against bishop, and against all
secular services, and how the Pope Agatho had confirmed
the same by his rescripts, and the Archbishop Deusdedit.”

All these details, however, in connection with the foun-
dation of this monastery are only to be read in one MS.

VITALIAN 9

of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. This MS. (Bodleian, 636)
seems to have been transcribed in the year 1122; and, from
the numerous entries in it that relate to Peterborough, it is
thought to have belonged to that monastery. It is further
supposed that the charters we have just quoted also first
saw the light in the twelfth century. No doubt, as they
now appear in the Bodleian MS., they are not exact copies
of the deeds of Wulfhere and Vitalian. Still, as there is
no doubt that the monastery of Peterborough was founded
about this time; and as there is no doubt that, as early
as the beginning of the seventh century, the custom of
placing monasteries under papal protection had begun,
it is far more likely that the Peterborough documents of
the Saxon Chronicle are more or less faithful copies of
genuine originals than that they are absolute forgeries.
It is in this belief that they have been cited here—the
more so that comparatively little is urged against them
even in the form in which they now exist.

The archbishop (Deusdedit), in whose presence the
consecration of the monastery of Peterborough is said
to have taken place, died soon after (July 14, 664), and
by the joint action of Oswin or Oswy, the powerful king
of Northumbria, and Bretwalda (“ who, though educated?
by the Scots, perfectly understood that the Roman was
the Catholic and Apostolic Church”), and Egbert of Kent,
one Wighard, who had been trained by the apostles
whom Pope Gregory had sent to England, was sent? to
Rome to be consecrated archbishop of Canterbury. On
arriving at Rome, Wighard made known the occasion of
his journey to the Pope. But unfortunately, “ with almost

1 Bede, H. £., iii. 29. “ Quamvis educatus a Scottis, quia Romana
esset catholica et apostolica Ecclesia veraciter intellexerat.”

2 Bede, 2J., and iv.1; and Hist. Abbat. Wir. n. 3; A. S. Chron.,
ad an. 667.

(2)
Wighara.

(3) Arch-
ishop
Theodore.

10 VITALIAN

all who went with him,” he was cut off by a pestilence.
This Vitalian notified Oswy in a letter, written probably
in 665, in which he praises his faith, exhorts him to follow
the traditions of those two great lights of the Church,
Peter and Paul, not only with regard to the Easter
question, but in all other points, tells him that he has
not been able to find a man suitable, “in accordance with
the tenour of his (Oswy’s) letters,” to be consecrated bishop
for England, but that he will send the first proper person
he can find, and thanks the king for the presents he
has sent him. “We therefore? beg your highness to
make haste to dedicate all your island to Christ our
God .... who will prosper it in all things, that it may
bring together a new people of Christ, establishing there
the Catholic and Apostolic faith.” Truly the Pope, being
the high priest of that year, prophesied. After having
made every effort to secure a proper person, Vitalian
finally fixed on a Greek monk who was in Rome, and
who was as distinguished for his good life as for his
learning, both sacred and profane. This monk, named
Theodore, resembled St. Paul not only in having been
born at the same place, viz. Tarsus in Cilicia, but also
in many points of his character. Both were learned,
both men of fiery energy (though Theodore was nearer
seventy years of age than sixty when he landed in
England), and both eaten up with zeal for the glory of
God. Such was the man whom Vitalian in his wisdom
ordained* (March 26, 668) for the English Church, to

1 Ap. Bede, iii. 29.

2 76, “¥estinet igitur, queesumus, vestra celsitudo, ut optamus,
totam suam insulam Deo Christo dedicare.. . qui (Christus) ei
cuncta prospera impertiet, ut novum Christi populum coarcervet,
cathoJicam ibi et apostolicam constituens fidem.”

8 Bede, 1. £., iv. 1; Hist, Abbat. Wir, n. 3.

472,

VITALIAN II

whom he subjected ! all the churches in Britain, and whom
he sent off to England (May 668) with letters of
commendation to John, metropolitan of Arles. It is not
for the historian of the popes to tell of the doings of
Theodore in England. Suffice it to say that to him, and
so to Pope Vitalian, who sent him, the English people
owe the deepest debt of gratitude. By his energetic
efforts to establish ecclesiastical unity in England, he
did more than any other man to make us the united
people we afterwards became. He inaugurated the golden
age of England; “for our kings,? being very brave men
and very good Christians, were a terror to all barbarous
nations, and the minds of all men were bent upon the
joys of the heavenly kingdom of which they had just
heard, and all who desired to be instructed in sacred
reading had masters at hand to teach them.” Theodore
ranks with those other great archbishops of Canterbury,
Anselm, Lanfranc, and St. Thomas a Becket, to whom
Englishmen owed the establishment and propagation of
such religious maxims and practice as made this country
known to the world as the ‘island of saints, and to whom
Englishmen of the present day even are largely indebted
for being the freest people on God’s earth.
In the history of every widely extended empire we read Maurus,

archbisho
of attempts, more or less successful, on the part of sub- of :

. ° Ravenna,
ordinate rulers to throw off or lessen their dependence aims at

. lesiasti-
on the supreme authority, and to make themselves as far as St sito.

possible independent. It has been with the Church as with "” ees

1 Ep. Vit. ad Theod., ap. Will. Malmesb., De Gest. Pont., i. (ed.
Migne, P. Z., 179, p. 1466). “ Nobis visum est commendare tue
sagacissime sanctitati omnes ecclesias in insula Britanniz positas.”
(i subg Pts lo pe272, etc.)

2 Bede, H. £., iv. 2. Vide Montalembert, Wonks of the West, iv.
p. 195 seg.; Lingard, A. Sax. Church, i. p. 66 seg. ; Alzog, Hist. of the
Church, ii. 61,

12 VITALIAN

temporal kingdoms. The subject powers in the Church
who carried matters to the greatest extremes were the
patriarchs of Constantinople. Bishops of a city second to
none in the empire, they thought that they themselves should
be second to none in the Church, that they should be in
the Church what the emperor was in the State. At the
period of which we are now treating, Maurus, Archbishop of
Ravenna, began to entertain somewhat similar views. To
him the residence of the exarchs made Ravenna politically
the first city in Italy, and himself at least as important as
the other great bishops of Milan and Aquileia. He would
therefore, like them, be more his own master; would be,
as it was then grandly called, ‘autocephalous. In 649
Maurus was submissive enough, and came, or rather sent,
his legates to Rome when summoned to the Lateran synod
by Pope Martin. But in 666, despite the canons of the
council of Nice and everything else, he refused to come to
Rome to tender his respects! to the Holy See. Encouraged,
perhaps inspired, by Constans, Maurus replied to a letter of
the Pope excommunicating him, by insolently attempting
the excommunication of the Pope. Both Vitalian and
Maurus wrote to the emperor. As might have been
expected, an imperial edict,? dated “Syracuse, March Ist,

1 This affair has been handed down to us by Agnellus himself, a
bishop of Ravenna, who about 840 wrote the Lives of the Bishops of
Ravenna, in a spirit hostile to the See of Rome. These lives have
been printed by Muratori, A. 7. S., ii.!; Migne, P. Z., t. 106, and in the
M. G. Hf. (Cf. Murat., Azmal,, vii. 48.)

2 A copy of this interesting document was found in the library that
belonged to the house of Este. It began: “ Kalend. Mart. Syrasusa.
Imperantibus Dominis nostris piisimis perpetuis Augustis, Constantino
majore Imperatore (sc. Constans), anno xxv.,” etc. .... “ Privilegiis
eam (Ecclesiam Ravennee) munientes, quibus ab omni majoris sedis
ditione exui et sui esse juris eam sanctamque ejus apostolicam ecclesiam
sancivimus .... Sancimus .... et non subjacere (eam) pro quolibet
modo patriarchee antique urbis Rome, sed manere eam autocephalon
» +. sicut reliqui metropolite”” He is to be consecrated by the

VITALIAN 13

the 25th year of the reign of Constans” (viz. 666), was
straightway issued to Maurus, in which the emperor
stated that orders had been sent to the exarch Gregory in
favour of Maurus, and in which he decreed that the
Church of Ravenna should in future not be subject to any
ecclesiastical superior, especially to the patriarch of ‘Old
Rome,’ but should be ‘ Autocephalous,’ It is believed that
this is the document which contemporary mosaics on the
left wall of the ‘mighty basilica’ of St. Apollinaris in Classis
(a sort of suburb of Ravenna) exhibit as being handed to
Reparatus, the successor of Maurus, and marked ‘ Pri-
vilegium. To as many as are not Erastians, but are
lovers of justice and respecters of Canon Law, this act of
Constans will be correctly set down as tyrannical, and fully
justifies the reflection of Muratori:1 “Ma di che non era
capace quest’ empio ed infelice Augusto!” Though
‘Reparatus “again subjected? the Church of Ravenna to
the Apostolic See,” there was more or less friction till the
Pontificate of Leo II., when Constantine Pogonatus? (the
Bearded) undid the work of his father, and the bishop of
Ravenna had to give up his ‘ Privilegium,

To prevent any misconstruction as to the meaning of
the decree of Constans, which has reached us only in a
very corrupt condition, or any misapprehension as to the
aims of the bishop of Ravenna, and to prevent it being

bishops of his own diocese, and ‘xostre divinitatis sanctione, have
the use of the pallium (Jon. Germ. Scr. Langob., p. 350). The
archbishops of Ravenna wanted to be as the archbishops of Milan and
Aquileia, and not to be included in the direct metropolitical jurisdic-
tion of the See of Rome. They did not take up a schismatical attitude
like the archbishops of Aquileia.

1 Annal., vi. 330. Pn vite Lom.

3 Z. P. in vit. S. Leo II. “Typum autocephaliz, quem sibi
elicuerant, ad amputanda scandala sedis Apostolicze restituerunt.”
See on p. 46, and cf. Muratori, Amnal., vi. 328 seg., 347; Hodgkin,
Italy, and her Invaders, vi. 347.

14 VITALIAN

thought that he had any intention of becoming a schismatic
and cutting himself off from all subjection to Rome, a few
facts connected with the various degrees of ecclesiastical
jurisdiction exercised by the Pope must be borne in mind.

Bevore the middle of the fourth century, the direct and
immediate jurisdiction of the Pope, as a primate or metro-
politan, extended over all Italy. All matters concerning
the election of bishops, for instance, in the parts subject to
his metropolitical jurisdiction, had to be referred to him
directly. But before the middle of the fifth century the
direct and immediate jurisdiction over northern Italy had
passed into the hands of the metropolitans of Milan,
Aquileia and Ravenna. The position of Ravenna, however,
among the other metropolitans was peculiar. His metro-
political jurisdiction extended only over Aemilia, which
was, therefore, outside the sphere of the Pope’s authority
as primate. The complex nature, then, of the position of
the bishop of Ravenna lies in this, as Duchesne! explains.
In the frzmatial province of Rome, in which his See of
Ravenna was situated, he was but a simple bishop;
whereas over Aemilia he was a metropolitan. To be
thus inferior to his brethren of Milan and Aquileia did
not suit the bishop of Ravenna. He, therefore, aspired
to be autocephalous, t.e.,to be in all respects like the bishops
just named. And this he sought for and obtained at the
hands of Constans.?

1 L. P., i. p. exxix and p. 348. Greenwood’s conclusion (Cathedra
Petri, i. 449) is to the same effect as that of Duchesne. “It appears,
therefore, that neither Maurus nor the emperor intended any more
than to secure to the ecclesiastical province of Ravenna the ordinary
canonical privileges of all metropolitan churches; that, namely, of
choosing and consecrating their own archprelate.”

2 And so the decree (wz sup.): “Sancimus .... manere eam
(Ravennatem ecclesiam) autocepalon ... . sicut reliqui metropolite
per diversas rei publicae manentes provincias, qui et a propriis con-
secratus episcopis.”

VITALIAN 15

This difference will be noted between the results of the

revolts of subordinate princes in temporal empires and in
that of the Church. In the one case the dismemberment
of the earthly kingdom has sooner or later inevitably been
the consequence. In the case of the Church, the one result
has been to strengthen the position of its Head, the Pope.
The great ones in the supernatural realm of the Church,
such as the patriarchs of Constantinople, who, from time
to time in the course of its history have endeavoured to
free themselves from subjection to the See of Peter—where
are they now? So insignificant are they, that they are
scarcely names in the civilised world.

For some cause, which is nowhere stated, John, ies Me
Bishop of Lappa in Crete, had been condemned by his Bishop of
metropolitan Paul, Archbishop of Crete, and his suffragans. Pee
John appealed to Rome, and begged the Pope that, “i
accordance! with the sacred canons and the institutions of
the Holy Fathers,” he would enquire into his case and pass
sentence according to his deserts. The Pope accordingly
summoned a synod (December 667); and, very indignant at
the high-handed manner in which John had been treated,
especially at the effort Paul had made to prevent the execu-
tion of John’s appeal to Rome, the synod declared John
innocent, annulled the sentence that had been passed upon
him, and ordained that reparation should be made him for the
losses he had sustained. Paul was exhorted by the Pope to
carry out his sentence that he (Paul) might not experience
the rigour of the canons.2_ Vitalian also wrote to Vaanus,

1 “ Nos obnixe postulavit . . . . ut secundum sacratissimos canones,
institutaque sanctorum Patrum ejus cause meritum requireremus, et
sententiam promulgaremus.” Ep. 1'Vital., ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 87, p.
999; or Mansi, xi., etc. It is principally from this letter that this
incident is known to us. ys.

pes Ttaque .... Sstatuimus per hujus nostree preeceptionis auctori-
tatem, omnia que a te tuaque synodo contra canonum instituta

Death of
Vitalian,
672.

16 VITALIAN

the emperor’s chamberlain, and to George, Bishop of
Syracuse, to see that John was restored to his See. Where
are we to find a part of the Church from which appeals have
not been directed to the Holy See from the time that that
part has had any Christian history at all? In all ages of
the Church the wronged and the oppressed have ever felt
that they had still a source of comfort and strength, and that
hope was not dead for them as long as they had Rome to
appeal to. Toa Christian the appeal to the See of Peter is,
and ever has been, as the appeal to Cesar for the Roman.
Vitalian was buried in St. Peter’s, January 27, 672, and
is on that day commemorated in the Roman Martyrology.
contraque legum decreta gesta confectave sunt, vel sententiam pro-

mulgatam adversus eum, inania et vacua esse,” wrote the Pope to
the metropolitan. This letter is dated Aug. 27, 668.

ADEODATUS.

A.D. 672-676.

——o—_—

Sources.—Practically the only source is the short ‘life’ in the
ZL. FP. Copies of two acts of this Pope exempting monasteries
from episcopal control are to be found in Migne, P. Z., t. 87,

Ppp. I141-5.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.

Constantine IV. (or V.) _ Perctarit (second Gregory, 664-677.
(Pogonatus), 668-685. time), 672-688.

OF Popes Adeodatus and his successor Donus, it may be Little
on : : k f
said in a word that we know nothing of them or their acts, this Pope

A and his
save that they were good men, made a few improvements successor.

in the fabrics of some of the churches, and, with more or
less wisdom, exempted a monastery or two from episcopal
control.

Adeodatus was a Roman, and the son of Jovinian. So Consecra-
@far resembling St. Gregory I., he was called to be Pope pera
from being a monk in a monastery! on the Coelian Hill oe ”

(viz., that of St. Erasmus). He was consecrated April 11,
672.
Of such a gentle and kind disposition was this Pontiff, His

character,
that he allowed everyone, great and small, ready access to

17. P. As Adeodatus and Deusdedit have the same meaning in
Latin, Adeodatus is sometimes called Deusdedit II.

WOOL, Ue UO Hite 2

Building
operations.

Privileges
to monas-
teries,

18 ADEODATUS

himself, was most affable to strangers, made everyone
feel that they would get from him whatever they wanted,
and increased the allowance or donative (vaga) the popes
were in the habit of making to the clergy and others.

Apart from additions he made to his monastery } on the
Coelian, he restored the Church of St. Peter in the Campus
Meruli, on the Via Portuensis, between the ninth and
eleventh milestones from the city. The same locality is
still known as the Campo di Merlo. His monastery of
St. Erasmus was originally established in the house of the
Valerii, perhaps the most honoured of all Rome’s great
patrician families. Adeodatus endowed it with the
revenues of many estates, concerning which an inscription,
some marble fragments of which were found by De Rossi,
still exists.

Wilkins, in his collection of British Councils, and other
editors of ‘Councils, have preserved for us a decree? of this
Pope (¢. 674), forbidding, at the request of Hadrian, the
abbot and companion of Archbishop ‘Theodore, the
monastery of SS. Peter and Paul at Canterbury to be
harassed by anyone, whether cleric or lay, and forbidding
anyone to be foisted on the monastery as abbot but the
one lawfully elected by the monks themselves.

About the same time the Pope addressed a letter to all

1 Duchesne, L. P., i. 347.

2 Thomas Sprott, a Benedictine monk of St. Augustine’s at Canter-
bury, who wrote about the year 1270, says of this decree, not in his
Chronicle strictly so called (as the editor’s note in Migne would lea
one to suppose), but in his Lives of the Abbots of Canterbury, after-
wards used by William Thorn a century later, in his continuation of the
Lives down to his own time: “After Hadrian became abbot of the
monastery of SS. Peter and Paul, he obtained a privilege from Pope
Adeodatus on the freedom of the monastery and on the election of its
abbots, Of this document we have not the original (sub plumbo) but
only a transcript.” Of course, this statement is reproduced in Thorn,

Chron., c. 3, § 2. Cf. the introduction to Sprott’s Chromicle by its first
editor, Bell (Liverpool, 1851).

ADEODATUS 19

the bishops of Gaul, informing them that, though the Holy
See’ was not wont to exempt monasteries from episcopal
control, still, as Crotpert, the bishop of Tours, had himself
exempted the monastery of St. Martin, he would confirm
the exemption of this house from the jurisdiction of the
ordinary.?

In this connection we may remark that, however advan-
tageous it was, not only for themselves but for civilisation
at large, that at times the monks should be freed from
dependence on the local bishop, there is no doubt that the
general acquisition of this privilege was fatal to the best
interests of the monks themselves. It is with communities
as with individuals. They cannot think too highly of the
good they do, nor too lightly of the harm. And it was
much easier to hide a diminution of virtue and a growth
of worldliness from the distant Bishop of Rome than from
the local ‘ordinary.’ Hence, when with the lapse of time
the degeneration, which overtakes everything of this earth,
fell upon the monastic orders, the exemptions they had
secured, ensured their ruin.?

Adeodatus was buried in St. Peter’s, June 16, or 17
according to Duchesne, 676.

1 Very wise was and is the custom of the Holy See not to free
monasteries from the jurisdiction of the bishop in whose diocese they
‘are. “Mos atque traditio sanctz nostree Ecclesiz plus non suppetat
a regimine episcopalis providentiz religiosa loca secernere,” writes Pope
Adeodatus. The authenticity of this letter has been much debated in
France. But Pagi (Brev. Gest. P. &. in vit. Adeod., n, 3) and others
have shown it to be genuine.

2 In renewing it, Gregory V. (P. Z., t. 137, p. 907) cites this privilege.

3 Hence St. Bernard declared (De considerat,, iii. 4) that the only

result of these grants of exemption was “quod inde episcopi
insolentiores, monachi etiam dissolutiores.”

Death of
Adeodatus,

676.

DONUS.
A.D. 676-678.
J

Source.—The ‘life,’ very short, in the Z. P.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCHS OF
EAST, LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Constantine Pogo- Perctarit (second time), Gregory, 664-677.
natus, 668-685. 672-688. Theodore, 677-687.

Consecrae AFTER an interval of 138 days, during which, we are told,

tion of

Donus,
Noy. 2,
676.

Repairs
churches,
etc.

took place the most fearful storms in the memory of man,’
there was consecrated as bishop of Rome, Donus, himself
a Roman, and the son of one Maurice.

‘During his short reign, of about a year and a half, Donus
flagged the atrium or quadrangle? in front of St. Peter’s
with great pieces of marble, and restored the Church of
St. Euphemia on the Appian Way, a church that no longer
exists, and the basilica of St. Paul on the Ostian Way, or,
according to the very probable conjecture of Duchesne, the
little church on the left of the road going to St. Paul’s,

1 7, P. in vit. Adeod.: “ Quales (tempestates) nullas ztas hominum
meminit esse”! It is astonishing how often such storms, nevertheless,
do occur! Had it not been, we are further informed, that God’s mercy
was won by daily ‘ Litanies,’ the necessary pursuits of agriculture could
not have been conducted.

“LP. Paul the Deacon, De Gest. Lov. ©. 30 C). Lamcianl,
Pagan and Christian Rome, p. 271.

DONUS 21

outstde the walls, where tradition tells that SS. Peter and
Paul parted on their way to martyrdom. Discovering in a
monastery, which was called after Boéthius, that there
were a body of Nestorian Syrian monks there, Donus dis-
persed them through the various monasteries in Rome, to
do penance or to prevent them from spreading their tenets
in the city, and gave over the monastery to Roman monks.
As we have noted above, Reparatus, Archbishop of pe
Ravenna, just before his death submitted to Pope Donus:.! atus of

avenna,

But if one great bishop showed himself dutiful to the Pope, but opposi-

it was not the case with Theodore, the patriarch of CaRet

of Constan

Constantinople, who, succeeding three successive Catholic tingpie,

prelates, became patriarch in the same year that Donus
became Pope. A letter concerning the settlement of the
Monothelite question, which Constantine Pogonatus
addressed to Donus, but which was delivered to Agatho,
as Donus was dead when the letter arrived, informs us
that Theodore, the patriarch of Constantinople, did not
send a synodical letter to Pope Donus. “ He feared,” ? adds
the emperor, “that it would be rejected by the Pope, like
those of his predecessors had been.” The patriarch
confined himself to sending a letter exhorting to peace.
Whether Donus returned any answer to this letter, or
whether even he was alive when it reached Rome, is not
known.
The very little that his biographer tells us of Donus Death of

terminates with the usual, “he was buried at St. Peter’s” ce

1 7, P., and Agnellus zz vzt. Rep., c. 116 ; and note 5 of Duchesne,
L. P., 1. 348-9.

2 Ep. Const., ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 87, p. 1147; alsoap. Mansi, xi., etc,
News must at times have travelled slowly between Rome and Con-
stantinople. Though Donus was buried Apr. 11, 678, Constantine’s
letter addressed to him is dated Aug. 12, 673!

3 “Suggessit (Theodorus) suspectum se esse, dirigere consueta syno-
dica ad vestram paternam beatitudinem, ne forsan non recipiantur,
sicut et preedecessoribus ejus patriarchis factum est.”

22 DONUS

(April 11, 678). His portrait, with that of Honorius, was
once to be seen in a mosaic which he himself erected in
the Church of St. Martina, in the Forum. The present
Church of St. Martina stands on the site of the medizval
Church, and that, again, stood on the site of the offices
of the Senate House (secretartum senatus).

Sli AG AD H.©.

A.D. 678-681.

Sources.—A rather longer ‘life’? in the Z. P, the work of a
contemporary (¢/ Duchesne, Z. P., i. 356). A few letters of
the Pope and others in connection with the Sixth General
Council, ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 87; Theophanes in Chron.; Bede,
ff, E., iv., for Agatho’s relations with England.

Modern Works—Cf. a learned, but prolix, dissertation,
“Della patria, santita, e dottrina del Pontefice Santo Agatone,”
by M. Scavo (Diss. IV., vol. 18 of Zaccaria’s Raccolta di
Dissert.).

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST, LOMBARDS, RAVENNA.
Constantine Pogo- Perctarit (second time), Theodore, 677-687.
natus, 668-685. (672-688).

THOUGH Pope Agatho reigned but for a short time, Import.
& : . t
his name is conspicuous in the history of the Church, aoe :

: 4 Agatho,
not only because he is honoured as a saint! both by the“ *"”°
Greeks and Latins, but because in his pontificate was
celebrated the Sixth C&cumenical Council, the third of
Constantinople (680), in which one more of the errors

1 So great was his reputation for sanctity that he was honoured with
the title of ‘ Thaumaturgus’ or ‘ Wonder-worker’ in the Menology of
the emperor Basil, and in the Greek Menzon. (On the Menzon and
the Greek Menologies, cf. Introduc. to Butlers Lzves of the Saints.) In

the Roman Martyrology (Jan. 10), we read of Agatho: “ Qui sanctitate
et doctrina conspicuus quievit in pace.”

Early
career of
Agatho.

Agatho,
Pope, June
27, 678.

Agatho
England.

24 ST. AGATHO

(Monothelism) that arose from a false view of the nature
of Our Lord Jesus Christ was condemned.

As what is known of the actions of Agatho practically
centres round this country and the General Council, his
doings in connection with the Church in England, and
then with the Council, will here be treated of after a little
has been said of the Pope himself.

A Sicilian by birth,! and by profession a monk, Agatho
was a man of remarkable affability and generosity. He
had a cheerful word and a smile for everybody,? and was
especially kind to his clergy. He would seem also to have
had a turn for finance, as, ‘contrary to custom, when he
became Pope, he took into his own hands the office of
treasurer of the Roman Church, and, with the aid of a
nomenclator, himself transacted the business of the treasury.
Ill health, to which he alludes in his letter to Constantine,
forced Agatho to appoint a treasurer with full powers as
usual.

It is not quite certain whether Agatho was consecrated in
June or July, as the data in the Book of the Popes do not tally.
Weare, however, disposed to agree with Pagi and Duchesne,
and to assign that event to Sunday, June 27, 678.

For the fifth time the indefatigable abbot of Wearmouth,
Benedict Biscop, appeared in Rome in the early days of
the pontificate of Agatho to obtain “for the ornament? and

1 By the general tradition of Sicily, Palermo was the place of Agatho’s
birth, There seems to be some reason to believe that the Pope was
the same Agatho concerning whom Pope St. Gregory I. wrote to
Urbicus, abbot of St. Hermes in Palermo. Gregory wrote (vi. 47 al.
48) that the abbot was to receive Agatho into the monastery, if his wife
also was willing to embrace conventual life. If this conjecture is well
founded, it gives plenty of material for the imagination to build up a
romantic early life of a centenarian pontiff! Cf Dissert. of Scavo.

2 “Tantum benignus et mansuetus fuit, ut etiam omnibus hilaris et
jucundus comprobaretur.” JZ. P.

3 Bede, Vit. abbat. Wiremuth., § 6, and H. E., iv. 18.

ST. AGATHO 25

defence of his Church” what he could not find even in
Gaul. Acting in accordance with the wish of Egffrid,
King of Northumbria, who had given the land for the
Wearmouth monastery, Benedict obtained from the Pope
a charter of privileges for the said monastery, and leave
to take back with him to England John, the arch-chanter
of St. Peter’s, to “teach in his monastery! the method of
singing throughout the year, as it was practised in St.
Peter’s at Rome.” John had, moreover, been commis-
sioned by the Pope “carefully to inform himself concerning
the faith of the English Church, and to give an account
thereof on his return to Rome.” “For,” continues Bede,
“the Pope was desirous of being informed concerning the
state of the Church in Britain, as well as in other provinces,
and to what extent it was chaste from the contagion of
heretics.” To satisfy the Pope,? the famous synod of
Heathfield or Hatfield was summoned by Archbishop
Theodore (September 17, 680). The faith in England
was found to be sound on all points. A profession of faith
was drawn up and sent to Rome, “and most thankfully
received by the Apostolic Pope and all those that heard
or read it.” :

It is said that there was also read at this same synod
a letter* of Pope Agatho, confirming, at the request of
Ethelred, King of the Mercians, Archbishop Theodore

1 Bede, Vit. abbat. Wiremuth., § 6, and H. £., iv. 18.

2 The heresy of the Monothelites is, of course, especially alluded to.

3 “Quamobrem collecta fro oc in Brittania synodo quam diximus,
inventa est in omnibus fides inviolata catholica,” 2d. This fact is zot
mentioned in the latest Anglican A/zstory of the English Church, by
W. Hunt.

4 To be found in full in Haddan and Stubdés, iii. 153 f.; and in part
in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ad an. 675. We quote from the latter
and use the translation of the Protestant editors of the series, Church
Historians of England. Most writers agree that there are at least
interpolations in the text of this letter; certainly where the abbot is
made the Pope’s legate!

26 ST. AGATHO

and others, for the abbey of Medehampstede (afterwards
known as Peterborough), of which we have spoken before,
exemption from payment of taxes or military service to
king, bishop, or earl; and forbidding the ‘ordinary’ or
‘shire-bishop’ to perform any episcopal functions within
the monastery except at the request of the abbot. “And
it is my will,” says the Pope, “that the abbot (of Mede-
hampstede) be holden as legate of Rome over all the
island, and that whatsoever abbot shall be there chosen by
the monks, be consecrated by the archbishop of Canterbury.
I will and concede that whatever man shall have made a
vow to go to Rome, which he may be unable to fulfil
through sickness or any other cause, let him come to the
monastery of Medehampstede and have the same forgive-
ness of Christ and St. Peter, and of the abbot and of
the monks, that he should have if he went to Rome.”
“This decree,”! says our earliest English chronicle,
“Agatho and 125 bishops sent to England by Wilfrid,
Archbishop of York.”

But, as was noted under the //e of Vitalian, full reliance
cannot be placed on these details in connection with
Medehampstede, as they are only to be found in the
twelfth century Peterborough MS. of the Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle.

Pe, What brought Wilfrid to Rome in the days of Pope
Agatho will now be ours to set forth as clearly as may
be, but shortly, as the career of this glorious Englishman

1 A.-S. Chron. ib. Wilfrid himself procured from Agatho various
privileges for his own monasteries of Ripon and Hexham. (Cf Eddii,
Vit. Wilf, c. 47, 51.) And at the request of Erconwald, Bishop of
London, the Pope is said to have given the right of electing the
bishops of London to the monks of the monastery of St. Paul’s,
London (Monast. Anglic., iii. 299). The latter of these privileges is,

however, marked as corrupt and spurious in Haddan and Stubbs
(Councéls, ili. 161).

ST. AGATHO 27

and servant of God belongs rather to the history of the
Church in this country than to the Lzves of the Popes.
Besides, his heroic life, his long undaunted struggle in the
cause of freedom, have been well written! of in books that
are easily accessible to the English reader. But as
Wilfrid came to Rome and the popes three times; and
as, towards the close of his days, he “thought ? of return-
ing once again to that See of Peter whence he had
received justice and freedom, to end his life there,’ he
cannot be passed over in treating of the popes from
Eugenius to John VI. Nor indeed should we care to
leave unnoticed him whom that noble Frenchman, the
Count de Montalembert, so great an admirer of our
nation, in the warm glow of his beautiful and eloquent
language,’ calls “the eldest son of an invincible race, the
first of the English nation”; the first of “that great line
of prelates, by turns apostolic and political, eloquent and
warlike, brave champions of Roman unity and ecclesiastical
independence, magnanimous representatives of the rights

1 Lingard, besides a brief notice of Wilfrid’s actions in his Wzstory of
England (i. pp. 69-71), has a full account of them in his History of the
Anglo-Saxon Church (i. pp. 117-132). See also Butler’s Lives of the
Saints for Oct. 12; Faber in the Puseyite Lives of the English Saints ;
and best of all, Montalembert in his Monks of the West, IV., bk. xii.
The ancient authorities for Wilfrid’s ‘life’ are of the first importance.
Cf. his ‘life’ by his friend Eddi Stephen (ap. Mabill., 4cz. SS. O. S. B.,
iv., ed. Venice), and Bede, 1. £,, ili. c. 25 seg. His ‘life’ was also
written in poor Latin verse by Fridegode, an English Benedictine, in
the tenth century, by order of St. Odo of Canterbury. Cf Preface to
vol. i. of the Aistorians of the Church of York (Chronicles and
Memorials of G. Brit.), where these and other lives of St. Wilfrid are
given together. Some authors rather distrust Eddi because he was so
strong a partisan of Wilfrid ; and, on the other hand, believe that Bede
was not so well disposed to him ; but for the latter idea there does not
seem any well-founded reason. Cf. English Hist. Rev., 1891, 535 f.

2 Edd., c. 62. “Scitote cogitationem meam, ut S. Petri Ap, sedem
iterum appellarem et viderem, unde /deratus fui frequenter.”

3 Monks of the West, iv. pp. 373, 368.

28 ST. AGATHO

of conscience, the liberties of the soul . . . a line to which
history presents no equal out of the Catholic Church of
England; a lineage of saints, heroes, confessors and
martyrs, which produced St. Dunstan, St. Lanfranc, St.
Anselm, St. Thomas a Becket, Stephen Langton, St.
Edmund the exile of Pontigny, and which ended in
Reginald Pole.’ Would that in detailing in brief
Wilfrid’s splendid course we might be filled with the
inspiring powers of expression of the illustrious author
of the Monks of the West!

Of a noble Northumbrian family, born about 634,
Wilfrid at the early age of fourteen joined himself to
the monks of Lindisfarne or Holy Island. We have
already seen, under the pontificate of Eugenius I., how
his expanding mind led him to Rome to seek for truth
at its source. Returned thence convinced of the import-
ance of unity even in small matters, such as the shape
of the tonsure to be worn by clerics, let alone in such
graver questions as the time of celebrating Easter, and
with his heart full of love for Rome and all its ways, he
began at once to oppose the Roman to the Celtic customs.
He was able to do this with the more effect that he was
called to be the tutor of Alchfrid, the son of King Oswin
or Oswy, the powerful sovereign of Northumbria. By
his abilities) his address, and the natural attractiveness of a
handsome person, he soon obtained great influence, and
succeeded in bringing about the famous assembly of
Whitby (664), in which the ‘Easter question’ was
settled for Northumbria. Naturally many of the defeated
adherents of the traditions of Columba never forgot Wilfrid’s
share in their discomfiture at Whitby; and, acting on the

1 Erat “pulcher aspectu, bonze indolis.” (Edd., c. 2); Bede, v. 19,
where Bede, who was a contemporary and acquaintance of Wilfrid,
has given us a sketch of his life, mainly from Eddius.

ST. AGATHO 29

proverb that all is fair in love and in war, never lost an
opportunity of opposing him. On the death of Bishop
Tuda, Wilfrid was elected! to succeed him as bishop ot
Northumbria. To be quite free from any taint of schism,
nothing would suit Wilfrid but that he should go to France
and get consecrated (665) by Agilbert, Bishop of Paris.
But during his absence a reaction had set in; and King
Oswy, gained over by the Celtic party, had one Ceadda or
Chad consecrated bishop of York. On his return Wilfrid
made no protest against this unkind and tyrannical act, but
retired to the famous monastery of Roman observance he
had founded at Ripon. “ Thus the saint begins to be visible
in his character.”? But in the year 669 there came to Eng-
land, as we have seen, sent by Pope Vitalian, the heroic old
Greek Theodore to be its metropolitan. And the old
man, who was afterwards to do so much wrong to
Wilfrid, began his ever-memorable pontificate in our
island by restoring Wilfrid to the bishopric of York,
with the consent of Oswy, who yielded to the apostolic
commission. After this, till the death of the great Bret-
walda (670), Wilfrid was again in full favour with Oswy,
and for some years with his son and successor Egfrid.
Wilfrid was, however, destined again to remember
that “faith was not to be put in princes.” The dislike
which Egfrid had begun to entertain for Wilfrid, on
account of an intricate and delicate cause, with which this

1 “Consenserunt reges et omnis populus huic electioni, et S.
Wilfritho presbytero omnis conventus in nomine Domini accipere
gradum episcopalem precepit.” Edd., c. 11-13. The kings were
wishful for one “qui voluisset sedis apostolic disciplinam sibi
facere,” 26, In the first instance, Alchfrid had given Wilfrid lands,
“finding him to be a Catholic,” and because he had himself “always
followed and loved the Catholic rules of the Church.” Bede, v. 19.

2 Montalembert, Monks of the West, iv. p. 189.

3 “Veniens ad regem... . statuta judicia apostolice sedis, unde
emissus venerat, secum deportans.” Edd., c. 15.

Council at
Rome, Oct.
679.

30 ST. AGATHO

work! has nothing to do, was augmented by his (Egfrid’s)
second wife Ermenburga. Jealous of the wealth and in-
fluence of Wilfrid, this Jezabel, as the saint’s biographer calls
her2 contrived, by constantly harping on the one theme, to
inspire her husband with the same base passion. The
pair, in their resolve to degrade Wilfrid, had the art to
engage Archbishop Theodore on their side. The arch-
bishop had long been rightly convinced that one bishop
for each of the eight Anglo-Saxon kingdoms was utterly
inadequate to the spiritual needs of England* Up to
this time, however, he had done nothing in the matter.
Now, gained over by Wilfrid’s enemies, he greatly cur-
tailed his jurisdiction (678) ; and out of his diocese formed
three new ones, for each of which he consecrated* a
bishop. Against this high-handed measure, which he
denounced as ‘mere robbery,’ Wilfrid protested, and
declared that he would appeal to the judgment of the
Holy See. To Rome accordingly Wilfrid journeyed ; and
there, after escaping many snares which his enemies had
caused to be laid for him, he arrived in 679. There also
arrived, with letters from Theodore, full of violent accusa-
tions against Wilfrid, a monk Coenwald.6 To examine the
affair thoroughly, Agatho summoned a council, in which
some fifty bishops and priests took part,’ and at which
1 Cf. Montalembert, 2d., iv. pp. 233-244.

2 “ Quasi impiissima Jezabel.” Edd., c. 24.

BBedew eee ives:

4 “ Tnordinate, adds Eddi (c. 24), solus ordinavit.” Bede, iv. 12.

5 Edd., 2d. “Tali judicio fraudabili non contentus, cum consilio
co-episcoporum suorum, judicium Apostolicae sedis magis legit,
sicut Paulus Ap. sine causa damnatus a Judeeis, Casarem appellavit.”

° Cf Ep. Joan., iv., ap. Edd. c. 52, and ap. Malmesb., De Gest.
Pont., \. iti., ap. Migne, t. 179, p. 1568. Cf 2d., p. 1558.

’ 1b, Edd., c. 29; Bede, v. 19. The complete acts of this Council
have perished ; but part of its work has been preserved for us by
Eddi (c. 29), William of Malmesbury (De Gest. Pont. Angl., iii., ap.

Migne, P. L., t. 179, p. 1558), etc. Cf. Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 136. The

ST. AGATHO 31

he presided in person. Feeling that the proceedings of
the court that listened to the first appeal to Rome from
England must be of special interest to Englishmen, we
will give them, as far as our sources will allow us, at
some length.

The counci] was held in the Lateran basilica, and was
opened by the Pope himself. Then the bishops of Ostia
and Portus arose, and, after laying down that the “ regulat-
ing * of all the churches was in the hands of the Pope, who
was in the place of Peter,” and declaring that they had
carefully read over the charges made against Wilfrid by
Theodore and others, and Wilfrid’s defence, found that he
had not been canonically deposed, and, on the contrary,
had evinced his moderation by keeping clear of broils
and quietly appealing to the Apostolic See, in which
Christ founded the primacy of the priesthood. At the
command of the Pope, Wilfrid was brought before the
assembly, and his (Wilfrid’s) petition read before the
synod. It begins: “I, Wilfrid, the humble and unworthy
bishop of the English? have come to this Apostolic
eminence, as to a tower of strength. And I trust that
I shall get justice, whence flows the rule of the sacred
canons to all the Churches of Christ.” The memorial then
goes on to show how uncanonically its author had been
treated, though no accusation is made against Archbishop
Theodore,? “because he had been commissioned by the
Apostolic See.” In conclusion, Wilfrid declares that he
council given by these authors (p. 131 f.) as a separate council, I take
to be only earlier sessions of the council spoken of in the text. It
dealt with the needs of the Church in England in general.

1 Qmnium quippe ecclesiarum ordinatio in vestra apostolicae
auctoritatis pendet arbitrio, qui vicem b. Petri apostoli geritis,” 2d.,

c. 29, ed. “ Master of the Rolls” as usual.

2 Saxonia. Edd., c. 30. at
3 “ Quem (Theodorum) quidem, eo quod ab hac Apostolicze summitatis

sede directus est, accusare non audeo,” 2d.

Present at
the synod
at Rome
against the
Mono-
thelites,
(680).

32 ST. AGATHO

will abide absolutely by the decision of the Holy See;
“to the equity of which! he has come with fullest con-
fidence.” Full of admiration at the spirit that animated
Wilfrid, the Pope and the synod decreed that he should be
restored, that the bishops who had replaced him should
be expelled; but that the archbishop should ordain as
coadjutors to Wilfrid, such men as the saint thought
proper to select himself in a synod assembled for that
purpose. All bishops and princes alike were commanded
to obey this decree, under pain of different penalties.
Various other decrees were also passed at this synod for
the better governing of the Church in England.2 We can
well understand that Wilfrid made no haste to return
home. The journey to Rome was a very serious under-
taking in those days, and there was much to be seen
there, even at a time when the city was going to decay ;
and much to interest and astonish an enlightened man
coming from this country. Wilfrid collected relics of the
saints,® and purchased a large variety of things for decorat-
ing his churches on his return.

Wilfrid stayed long enough in Rome to be present at the
synod of 125 bishops (March 27, 680), assembled by Pope
Agatho (which will be spoken of presently), to select
deputies to be sent to Constantinople to assist at a general
council to be held against Monothelism. Wilfrid sub-
scribed as “ Bishop of York,* who had appealed to and had
been absolved by the Apostolic See, and who, sitting as
judge in synod with 125 other bishops, confessed by his
signature the true and Catholic faith, in the name of all the

1 “Ad cujus zequitatem, cum tota mentis confidentia properavi,” zd,
Cf. also pp. 134, 193, 232, vol. i. Historians of the Church of York.
for accounts of this synod by Fridegode, Eadmer, etc.

2 Cf. Haddan and Stubbs, Conc., iii. 136 f. SEE dd eGases

* Ed. c. 53. “ Wilfrithus .... Apostolicam sedem de sua causa
appellans, et ab hac potestate . . . . absolutus,” etc.

ST. AGATHO 33

northern parts of Britain, Ireland, and the islands inhabited
by the Britons and the Angles, the Scots and the Picts.”

By the order of the Pope, Wilfrid returned to England
after this council, and humbly showed to Egfrid the
decrees in his (Wilfrid’s) favour.!. But the king and his
councillors, pretending that they had been bought? had
Wilfrid imprisoned. In vain the king tried to bribe
Wilfrid into acknowledging that the Apostolic briefs were
forged. But, full of trust in the authority of the Holy See,
Wilfrid declared that he would sooner have his head struck
from his body than make such a declaration.®

After some months’ imprisonment, Wilfrid was released
from prison, but banished the kingdom of Northumbria.
After having been driven from one kingdom to
another, he was engaged in improving his exile by
labouring for the conversion of the pagan inhabitants of
Sussex, when Archbishop Theodore, made to examine into
his conduct by the consciousness of approaching death,
realised that he had, in his treatment of Wilfrid, been false
as well to him as to the authority of the Holy See* He
became perfectly reconciled to him, and procured for him
from Aldfrid, the successor of Egfrid, the restoration of
his See > (686).

But Wilfrid’s old opponents, the upholders of the Celtic
traditions, had only been scotched, not killed. They excited

t Bdd', ic: 33,34:

2 “Diffamaverunt .... ut pretio redempta essent scripta, que ad
salutem observantium ab Apostolica sede destinata sunt” (2d., c. 34).

3 “Cum fiducia Apostolicae auctoritatis, respondit prius se capite
truncandum esse, quam id unquam confiteri velle ” (zd., c. 36).

4 “ Auctoritatem apostolicee sedis, a qua missus est, metu agitante

honorificans cum b. episcopo...-. amicitiam..,. inire.... non
distulit” (2., c. 43)- '
5 “ Aldfrithus .... secundum Agathonis .... et sancta synodi

judicium, propriam sedem episcopalem in Eboraca civitate....,
reddidit” (20., c. 44).
VOL, f, °PT. If, 3

34 ST. AGATHO

enmities between Wilfrid and the king; and after some
years of bickering, Wilfrid’ was again an exile (691).
Archbishop Brithwald also, the successor of Theodore,
turned on Wilfrid ; and at a great council at Ouestrefelda
(703), probably Austerfeld, a little village on the borders of
Yorkshire and Notts, and near Edwinstow in Sherwood
Forest, Wilfrid was required to resign his bishopric. But
asking them how they dared to resist the decrees of Popes
Agatho, Benedict and Sergius in his behalf, and pointing
out what he had done for the Church of Northumbria
during his forty years’ episcopate, he again appealed to
Rome2 Arrived in Rome, “as it were at his mother’s
breast,” ® he was summoned before a synod presided over
by Pope John VI. (704).4 In seventy sessions the points in
dispute between the envoys of Brithwald and Wilfrid were
thoroughly sifted. Wilfrid urged that now for the third
time had he come to Rome for help, and asked for a favour-
able hearing, as he had received verdicts in his behalf from
Popes Agatho, Benedict and Sergius, and as the action of
the Apostolic See was wont to be even and consistent.2 In
the course of the proceedings, the assembly learnt with
amazement from the testimony of the oldest among them
thatthe venerable septuagenarian in their midst was thesame
Wilfrid who twenty-four years previously had subscribed
to the decrees of the Roman council against the Mono-

1 “Postremo maxima flamma exardescente, de regione Ultra-

Humbrensium sanctus homo Dei a rege Aldfritho expulsus, recessit ”
(Edd., c. 46).

2 “Fiducialiter sedem appello Apostolicam” (zd., c. 47).

3 “Ad hanc gloriosissimam sedem, quasi ad matris gremium, con-
fugimus ” (z0., c. 50).

* “Tunc Johannes papa, cum coepiscopis suis undique congregatis

. ad synodalem veniens, praesentato Wilfritho,” etc. (24., c. 50) ;

“Tntroductis quoque . . . . a Sancto Berthwaldo archiepiscopo ... .
viris directis ad Apostolicam sedem,” 2d., c. 52.
a af ae apostolicorum virorum individua semper esse solet”
26., C. 51).

ST. AGATHO 35

thelites! With one voice the astonished multitude expressed
their sorrow that one who had for over forty years been a
bishop should be treated with the indignity that Wilfrid
had been. Whereupon the Pope, having declared that in
all the careful examinations they had made of the case, the
synod had found no crime in Wilfrid, declared him absolved
from the charges brought against him.?

He then put into Wilfrid’s hands a letter? for Ethelred,
King of the Mercians, and Aldfrid, King of Northumbria.
He tells them how grieved the whole Church was at the
discord in their midst, exhorts them to be obedient, points
out the care with which the case had been gone into at
Rome, and orders? Brithwald to summon a synod, to
bring before it Wilfrid and the usurpers of his See, and to
settle the difference between them. If that cannot be
done, they are to be sent to Rome to be tried, under
penalty, if any refuse to come, of being deposed and
excommunicated. At the command of the synod, Wilfrid
set out for England. The archbishop and King Ethelred ®
promised obedience to the Pope’s orders. But Aldfrid
declared that what he and the archbishop ‘sent from
Rome’ had decided, he would never, while he lived, change
on account of what it had been thought fit to call the

1 Edd., c. 53.

2 Ap. Edd. c. 54, and Will. Malms., De Gest. Pont., ap. Migne,
t. 179, p. 1568.

3 “Commonemus Berchualdum, presulem S, Cantuariorum ecclesie,
quem auctoritate principis App. archiepiscopum ibidem confirmavimus,
ut synodum convocet,” 7. It may be noted in passing, that whence
Brithwald received his authority is stated by Eddius, not only in the
above quotation, but also in c. 53, where he is spoken of as: ab hac
sede apostolica emissus” ; and “ab hujus apostolicze sedis monarchia

directus.”
4 Edd., c. 55. - i
6 Ethelred, with the greatest humility, declared “Hujus Apostolicae

auctoritatis scriptis, ne unius quidem literee apicem unquam in vita
mea condemnabo,” 2@., Cc. 57.

36 ST. AGATHO

decrees! of the Apostolic See! But, quietly adds the bio-
grapher, from whose spirited pen we have all these most
interesting details: “ Afterwards he compittely changed his
decision, and was truly sorry for his conduct.” Taken sud-
denly ill, he confessed the sin he had been guilty of against
Wilfrid and the Apostolic See,? but died before he could
make reparation (705). Eadwulf, the successor of Aldfrid,
was even more violent than Aldfrid, but his reign was
limited to a duration of two months; and under his
successor Osred, the dying wishes of his (Osred’s) father
Aldfrid were carried out.

Brithwald summoned the synod (705) the Pope had
ordered to meet, at the village of Nidd, on the river of
the same name,® south of Ripon. In the presence of the
bishops, of the king, and his nobles, the decrees of the
Pope were read and explained. The bishops, after some
consultation, became reconciled with Wilfrid, and his two
great monasteries of Ripon and Hexham were restored to
him ; and he was restored to the See of Hexham. “And
thus he lived* in peace four years, ze. until the day of his
death” (709).

In this sketch of the life of St. Wilfrid, there is one fact
that cannot fail to impress itself on the reader. In the
histories which have come down to us of the struggle for
liberty on the part of the people in the earlier days of the
countries of Europe, Rome and the popes are always to
be seen as most useful and trustworthy allies of its
champions. The history of St. Wilfrid gives us a striking
instance of this truth. In his long contest for his rights
* “Quod nos cum archiepiscopo ab Apostolica sede emisso ..; .
judicavimus, hoc quamdiu vixero, propter Apostolicae sedis (ut dicitis)

scripta, nunquam volo mutare. Et hanc sententiam plene postmodum
mutavit, et vere poenituit eum” (Edd., c. 58).

‘ HAC, 150); 8 16., 'c: 60;
Bede, 1. Z., v.19. Cf v. c. 3, and Edd., c. 60.

ST. AGATHO 37

as a bishop, Wilfrid was really fighting for the rights of
every citizen against the arbitrary tyranny of kings. He
was doing battle for that personal freedom we English
value so highly ; and his allies were the popes of Rome.
With their power behind him, he finally triumphed over
despotism ; and in his victory the nation shared. Especi-
ally did they reap its fruits in the freedom he won for the
episcopacy. “Thanks to him,! until the Norman Conquest,
four centuries later, no English king dared arbitrarily depose
a bishop from his See.” In a bid for liberty, what chance
have the people, when the king has the clergy at his beck?
Is it not hence strange to find freedom-loving Englishmen
railing against men like St. Dunstan and St. Thomas a
Becket? It is due to the heroic resistance of such men
against would-be absolutism that we are the free nation
that we are to-day.

- But we must return to Pope Agatho and the principal
event in his reign—the Sixth General Council. Victor
over the Caliph? Muaviah (or Moawyah) (678), and at
peace with the Avars, thus causing “a universal? state
of security both in East and West,” Constantine deter-
mined‘ to try and bring about the same universal peace
in the Church. He accordingly wrote (August 12, 678)
a letter, already several times quoted, to Pope Donus,
“ Archbishop of Old Rome and Universal Pope.” It was

1 Montalembert, J/omks, etc., iv. p. 364; Stubbs, Comstzt. Hist., 1.221.

2 Theophanes in Chrom., ad an. 671; Bury, “est. of the Later
Roman Empire, bk. v., ¢. 9.

3 7b., vol. ii. 313.

4 Finlay, History of Greece, vol. i. p. 381, who thinks his ‘superior
orthodoxy’ to be the one only noteworthy point about Constantine
Pogonatus, still calls him “an intelligent and just prince, who, though he
did not possess. the stubborn determination and talents of his father, was
destitute also of his violent passions and imprudent character.”

& Hist. Conc. ed. Labbe, vi. ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 87, p. 3147.
Héfélé, v. p. 138, Eng. ed. “Tempus non recipit perfectam congrega-
tionem fieri,”

38 ST. AGATHO

received ! by Agatho, and begins by observing that the Pope
knows that he (the emperor) has been often asked to have
a discussion on the question in dispute between the two
Sees of Rome and Constantinople. He has never agreed,
because partial discussion only made matters worse, and
the times had hitherto been unfavourable for the holding
of a general council. As, therefore, the times will not
permit the summoning of a general council to end the
unfortunate discussion, the emperor begs the Pope to send
learned men, furnished with the needful books, and with
full powers to speak in the name of the Pope and his
council (cuyddov), in order to confer with the patriarch of
Constantinople, and Macarius, patriarch of Antioch; and
by the grace of the Holy Spirit to agree upon the truth.
The emperor will show no favour to either party, but will
receive the papal legates with fitting honour. He suggests
that the Pope might send as deputies three clerics? to
represent the Roman Church, and some twelve bishops
and metropolitans, with four monks from each of the four
Greek monasteries in Rome, to represent the rest of his
patriarchate. The letter concludes with the assurance
that the emperor has ordered the exarch Theodore to do

17, P. “Hic suscepit jussionem .... missam Dono papa, in-
vitantem .... ut debeat .... missos suos dirigere in regiam
urbem pro adunatione facienda,” etc. In some letter, in connection
with the calling of this general council, addressed to the Pope, and of
which Pope Gregory II. has preserved us a fragment in his first
letter to the emperor Leo, Constantine declared that he would
not attempt to sit or speak as emperor among the bishops, but
simply act as one of themselves, and carry out what they decided
upon. “Neque cum illis tamquam Imperator sedebo, aut imperi-
ose loquar .... et prout statuerint Pontifices, ego exequar” (Latin
version).

2 “Ex vestra sancta Ecclesia (si utique videtur ei) tres person
sufficiant ; quod si et plures, quantz ei placuerunt, dirigat,” 7d. The
word ‘synod, which often occurs in this letter, simply means
‘province,’

ST. AGATHO 39

everything for the safety and convenience of those who
should be sent to Constantinople.

Agatho at once fell in with these views of the emperor ; Agatho

‘ ; orders the

and to give the greater weight to the words of those who holding of
. 5 ds i

were to be his legates at Constantinople, he ordered the West,
: : Rel

synods to be held in the different countries of the West, !othe

so that his deputies would speak with its united voice. @o°°') ,,

We know of synods being, in consequence, held at Milan,? Pe bed ™
and at Heathfield? in England. And in Rome there met ?°P!*
together in synod 125 bishops, in the Easter week of
680.2 After this assembly broke up, the priests Theodore
and George, and the deacon John, who was afterwards
to be Pope (John V.), representing the Pope, and three
bishops, to speak for the whole West, set out for
Constantinople‘ bearing two long letters for the emperor,
one® from Pope Agatho himself, and the other from the
bishops of the Roman synod.

In his letter to Constantine, Agatho says he would
have sent the deputies before, but had been prevented,
not only by his own illness, but chiefly by the time he
had had to wait for the assembling of the bishops from
the more distant parts of his patriarchate. The deputies
he is now sending are not to be estimated by their
scientific attainments. For how,® asks the Pope, can

1 Cf. synodal letter, ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 87, p. 1261 : Mansi, etc.

2 Bede, H. E£., iv.c. 17,18. Vide sup., p. 25.

8 Cf. Vit. S. Wilfrid, c. 53. It is from this source alone that we know
any of the details of this synod.

4 Bede, De sex etat., sub. an. 688; Z. P.; ep. 1, Agath. ; and ep.
Constant. ad Georgium Constant.

5 These letters are to be found in Migne, t. 87, pp. 1161 and 1215;
and in Mansi, t. xi., and Hardouin, t. ili., etc. Cf. Héfélé, v. 142 seg.

6 We subjoin the original of this passage, as it is the one constantly
quoted to show the decay of learning even in the Eternal City. No
doubt something must be allowed to the ‘modesty’ of the Pope; but
on the other hand the prolixity of this very letter, and the length and
complexity of many of its sentences, show, at any rate, the absence of

40 ST. AGATHO

men who have to live in the midst of enemies and
who have to earn their daily bread by the labour of
their hands, find time for acquiring learning? Still they
would be found men well able to hand on inviolate the
deposit of faith they had received from their ancestors
in the faith, He then lays down the doctrine of the
two wills and operations, as he has received it from?
his predecessors. This, he adds, is the true belief of
Christianity, taught not by human wit but by the Holy
Ghost through the princes of the apostles. This is the
confession of him who was pronounced ‘blessed, in that
he received his revelation from heaven, and of him to
whom the Redeemer of Mankind thrice committed His
sheep and under whose guidance this Church has never
swerved from the way of truth in any particular—this
Church, whose authority, as that of the prince of all the
apostles, the whole Catholic Church and all the cecumenical
councils have ever embraced and followed, and whom
heretics have on the contrary ever attacked with falsehood
and hatred. The rule of the true faith, the Apostolic
Church will preserve perfect to the end in accordance
with the prayer of Our Lord (St. Luke xxii. 31, 32) that
Peter’s faith might not fail.

Hence, continues the Pope, when the patriarchs of
Constantinople endeavoured to introduce heretical novelties

polish in the learning of the time. “Apud homines in medio gentium
positos, et de labore corporis quotidianum victum cum summa
hesitatione conquirentes, quomodo ad plenum poterit inveniri Scrip-
turarum scientia?”

1 “Quam percepimus per apostolicam apostolicorumque pontificum
traditionem. . . . Heec est Christiane religionis vera atque immaculata
professio, quam non humana adinvenit versutia, sed Spiritus S. per
app. principes docuit.” .. . Heec est ejus confessio “cujus annitente
presidio, heec apostolica ejus Ecclesia numquam a via veritatis in
qualibet erroris parte deflexa est.” This Agatho insists on several
times in the course of this letter, whence we may infer, parenthetically,
that he knew that Pope Honorius had not fallen into Monothelism,

ST. AGATHO 4l

into Christ’s unspotted Church, my predecessors never
ceased exhorting them to desist from their errors, at
least by keeping silence (saltem tacendo, a clear allusion
to the attitude of Pope Honorius towards Sergius).
Agatho then proceeds to enlarge upon the ‘two natural
wills and operations, adducing in support of his explana-
tion testimonies from the writings of the Greek Fathers,
He shows how Sergius and his heretical successors varied
even in their errors, from which the Church must be
withdrawn and all must ‘with us’ confess the truth
founded on the firm rock! of that Peter who preserves
his Church from error. In conclusion, the Pope earnestly
begs the emperor to see that all be allowed freedom of
speech at the forthcoming council.

The synodal letter, signed by the Pope and the 125
bishops present at the council, is quite to the same effect,
insisting just as strongly and repeatedly on the infallibility
of the See of Peter. The bearers of these letters reached
Constantinople on September 10, 680, and were honour-
ably received? by the emperor, who, the very same day,
addressed a mandate® to the patriarch George, in which he
gave his sanction to his summoning to Constantinople the
bishops subject to his jurisdiction, for the purpose of
discussing the question of the ‘wills’ in Our Lord.
George was also informed that the emperor had given
the same sanction to Macarius of Antioch.

In consequence of this energetic action on the part of de
the emperor, the Sixth G&cumenical Council was opened Coane

680-Sep,

1 “ Quee (b. Petri App. principis Ecclesia) ejus gratia atque presidio 16, 681.
ab omni errore illibata permanet.”

2 7. P.; Bede, De sex etat., ad an. 688.

3 Conc. “Sancimus congregare vestram paternam beatitudinem

omnes, qui ad ejus sanctissimam sedem pertinent, ... . episcopos
in hanc regiam urbem.” On the Sixth General Council, read Héfélé,

§ 312 f,

42 ST. AGATHO

November 7,680. Theophanes? assures us that 289 bishops
and ‘fathers’ took part in it, but the minutes of the council
only give us forty-three bishops as present at the first
session, and 174 at the last. The council was held® in a
hall of the imperial palace, known by the name ‘ Trullus,
from being furnished with a cupola or dome.

The proceedings were opened by the Papal legates $ cand
they signed first the minutes of the last session. The
emperor was present in person at many of the sessions.

The Fathers, in council assembled, pronounced that the
Monothelites had forged various documents; decreed the
restoration of the name of Pope Vitalian to the diptychs ;
condemned and declared degraded Macarius of Antioch
for his obstinate adhesion to Monothelism ; anathematised,
in their thirteenth session, Sergius, Cyrus of Alexandria
and the other Eastern leaders of Monothelism, and moreover
Honorius, who was formerly Pope* of Old Rome; and in
their eighteenth and closing session (September 16, 681)
issued their decree relative to the two wills in Our Lord.
The Fathers of the council, after declaring that they
received with full trust (qicrés, fidelzter), and greeted with

1 Ad ann. 671-2, in Chron.; Bede, De sex efat., ad an. 688, gives
150 bishops, as does the Z. P.

2 LZ. P.; and the Acts of the Council. In the biography (Z. P.) of
Agatho, a summary of the doings of many sessions of the Sixth Council
will be found, only move or less accurate.

* According even to Photius (AZystagogia, ap. Migne, P. G. L., cii.
p. 367): “Though not present in body Agatho summoned the sixth
synod, and by his doctrine and ardent zeal was its ornament.” Cy also
the Liber Diurnus, which gives (form. 84, ed. Sickel) 175 as the number
of bishops present at the council; and brings out the position of the
emperor (eo presidente) and the Pope at the council—“cui Agatho
papa per legatos suos et responsales prefuit.” C/ form. 85, “in qua
(sexta synodo) et apostolicee sedis legatos presidere manifestum est.”

4 “ Cum his vero simul projici a sancta Dei catholica ecclesia simulque
anathematizari preevidimus et Honorium . . . . eo quod invenimus per

scripta, quee ab eo facta sunt ad Sergium, quia in omnibus ejus mentem
secutus est, impia dogmata confirmavit” (Actio 13).

ST. AGATHO 43

uplifted hands the letter of Pope Agatho to the emperor,
and the synodal letter of the bishops assembled under him,
and that they followed the five preceding general councils,
unfolded at length, and with great perspicuity, the Catholic
doctrine of the two wills and energies in Our Lord.

At the close of the synod a letter was presented to the
emperor, in which the bishops inform him that, inspired+ by
the Holy Ghost, in full agreement with one another, and
following the dogmatic letter of their most holy father
Agatho, and that of the synod held by him, they declare
the two wills in Christ, and that they condemn Sergius,
etc., and Honorius, as he followed them (utpote gui eos in
his secutus est). They point out that the zeal of the Pope
or the synod is not to be blamed, as they were merely
acting on the defensive, and that in their behalf fought?
the prince of the apostles, inasmuch as his imitator and
successor is their supporter, and in his letter explained to
them the divine mysteries. Peter spoke through Agatho.

A letter was also despatched to Pope Agatho, “ the wise
physician granted by Our Lord to banish disease from the
Church and to restore health to its members.” To him, as
to the bishop? of the first See in the universal Church (wz
prime sedis antistitd, ws mpwroOpovy), and as standing on the
firm rock of faith, the fathers of the council leave what
has to be done. In accordance* with the sentence

1 “Proinde inspiratione S. Spiritus conspirantes, et ad invicem
omnes consonantes atque consentientes, et Agathonis sanctissimi patris
nostri et summi Papze dogmaticis litteris . . . . consentientes, necnon
et suggestioni sanctee, que sub eo est synodi 125 Patrum, con-
cordantes,” etc., ap. Mansi, xi. 658 ; Hardouin, ili.

2 “ Nobiscum concertabat App. princeps ; illius enim imitatorem, et
sedis successorem habuimus fautorem, et divini sacramenti mysterium
illustrantem per litteras .... et per Agathonem Petrus loquebatur,”
2b.

3 “Tibi, ut prime sedis antistiti universalis Ecclesie, quid gerendum
sit relinquimus, stanti super firmam fidei petram,” ap. Mansi, x1. 683.

4 “Ex sententia per sacras vestras litteras de iis prius lata,” 2,

44 ST. AGATHO

previously passed upon them in the Pope's letters, they
had anathematised the heretics, Theodore of Pharan,
Sergius, Honorius, etc., and, enlightened by the Holy Ghost,
and with the Pope’s instructions to guide them (rais vmerép-
as didackarias ddyyovuevot), had proclaimed the doctrine
of the two wills. And as with the Pope they have shed
abroad the light of the orthodox faith, they beg him to
confirm their action in writing.

The emperor, on his side, issued an edict? enjoining all,
whether cleric or lay, under pain of punishment to accept
the decrees of the council. And with the returning papal
legates, he also sent a letter to Pope Leo II., as word had
reached Constantinople, before the Roman legates left it,
that Pope Agatho had died (January 10, 681). Leo was
informed of what had been done by the council, and of the
contumaciousness and subsequent deposition of Macarius
and others, who refused® to receive the letters of Pope
Agatho, thus flying in the face, as it were, of Peter, the
leader and prince. However, as Macarius and his sup-
porters had all in writing begged him (Constantine) to
send them to the Pope, he has done so, and leaves their
case in the Pope’s hands.

Leo in his reply (after September 682) confirmed the
decrees of the Sixth General Council, and, as we shall see in

1 “Quam (orthodoxe fidei lucem) ut iterum per honorabilia vestra
rescripta confirmetis, vestram oramus paternam sanctitatem,” Ap.
Mansi, etc.

BNO:

; * “ Renuit omnino sacratissimis Agathonis litteris assentiri, veluti in
ipsum corypheeum ac principem Petrum insaniens.” The emperor has
a little joke against Macarius; he informs the Pope that Macarius,
despite his name (which in Greek means happy), was not blessed |

“Omnes (Macarius, etc.) scriptis precibus Serenitatem nostram
communiter precati sunt, ut eos ad vestram beatitudinem mitteremus.
Sic igitur fecimus . . . . vestro judicio omnem ipsorum causam per-

mittentes.” Ep. ap. Mansi, etc. What confidence in the justice and
clemency of Rome does not this appeal of Macarius show !

ST. AGATHO AS

his /zfe, notified them to the West. In his letter of con-
firmation to the emperor, Leo said that as the acts of the
council were in agreement! with the faith of Pope Agatho
and his synod, he therefore assented to what had been
defined, and by the authority of Blessed Peter confirmed
its decrees and received it as he did the five preceding
general couricils. Leo proceeded to condemn Theodore,
Cyrus, and the other Monothelite leaders, and Honorius,
who, by his teaching (doctrina) obscured the Apostolic See,
and by a profane surrender would have overthrown the
immaculate faith (profana proditione itmmaculatam fidem
- subvertere conatus est); or, following the Greek version,
permitted the spotless to be stained.

With regard to Macarius and his followers, the Pope had
up till then not been able to effect much.”

The definitions of the Sixth General Council were
practically the death-knell of Monothelism. The names
of the heretical patriarchs from Sergius to Peter were
removed from? the diptychs, and their portraits from
wherever they were to be found either in the churches
or in the public places. Deprived of State support, and
receiving no encouragement from the higher clergy,
Monothelism soon ‘died the death’; for its attempted
revival by the Emperor Philippicus partook of the
ephemeral nature of the reign of that prince.

1 “ Sancta universalis et magna sexta synodus .. . . apostolicam in
omnibus :regulam et probabilium patrum doctrinam secuta est, et quia
definitionem rectz fidei plenissime preedicavit, quam et apostolica sedes
b. Petri Ap. (cujus licet impares ministerio fungimur), veneranter sus-
cepit, idcirco et nos, et per nostrum officium heec veneranda sedes apos-
tolica concorditer et unanimiter his, que definita sunt ab ea consentit,
et beati Petri auctoritate confirmat,” etc. (Ep. Leo, ap. Mansi, xi., etc.).

2 Cf. L. P. in vit. S. Leonis II, From that source we learn that, on
the feast of the Epiphany (Jan. 6, 683), Leo received back again into
Catholic communion two of those who had been sent to him. The rest,
with whom he could do nothing, were shut up in different monasteries,

8 L, P, § 12.

Decree
regarding
papal
elections,
680,

Theodore
of Ravenna
submits to
Pope
Agatho,
680,

46 ST. AGATHO

What caused the emperors proposed ‘conference’ to
become an cecumenical council is not known. Perhaps it
was because it was found that deputies from all the five
great patriarchal Sees had arrived in Constantinople, and it
was felt that the decisions of a general council would put
an end to the ‘ one-will’ heresy at once.

The Pope’s legates at Constantinople were successful in
their mission not only from a doctrinal, but also from a
temporal point of view. They induc>1 Constantine to
lessen the tax the popes had to pay at their ordination—
an impost first levied by the Gothic kings. He also did
away with the delegated power by which the exarchs of
Ravenna had confirmed the papal elections, again reserving
that right to the emperors. He even waived that right
later on. It must not be forgotten, however, that, as
already noticed, the exact meaning of this decree is not

established. Those who believe that papal confirmation

by the exarch did not begin till the time of John V. (685),
hold that this decree of Constantine simply proclaims that,
while he remitted the money payment for the imperial rati-
fication, he made it clear that he only did so on the under-
standing that there was to be no alteration in the ancient
custom of seeking for imperial assent to the election.

In the history of the intermittent struggle of the Arch-
bishops of Ravenna for increased independence,? we read
that Theodore (677-691) followed in the footsteps of his
immediate predecessor (Reparatus), submitted? to the

1Z. P.. § 13. “Hic suscepit divalem jussionem secundum suam
postulationem, ut suggessit, per quam revelata est quantitas qui solita
erat dari pro ordinatione pontificis facienda ; sic tamen ut si contigerit
post ejus transitum electionem fieri, non debeat ordinari qui electus
fuerit, nisi prius decretus generalis introducatur in regia urbe,
secundum antiquam consuetudinem, et cum eorum scientiam et
jussionem debeat ordinatio provenire.”

2 Vide supra, p. 11 f.

3 Z.P. “Hujus (Agathonis) temporibus Theodorus archiepiscopus

ST. AGATHO 47

Pope Agatho, and assisted at the Roman council of 680.
We are assured by Agnellus, the episcopal historian of his
predecessors in the See of Ravenna, that Theodore made
an arrangement with Pope Leo II. (682), that the arch-
bishops of Ravenna were not to be obliged to stay in
Rome more than eight days at the time of their consecra-
tion, nor to come to Rome themselves afterwards, but were
each year to send one of their priests to do homage to the
Pope. However, it was during the same pontificate that
Constantine Pogonatus decreed! the restoring of the
Church of Ravenna to subjection to the See of Rome,
and that the archbishop elect should, in accordance with
ancient custom, go to Rome to be ordained. And the
Pope himself decreed that the anniversary of Maurus, the
first rebellious archbishop of Ravenna, should not be
observed. For a time we shall hear no more, after St.
Leo II., of the autonomy of Ravenna.?

The Book of the Popes, after telling us that Agatho® gave Dee

gatho,

a large sum for lights for the churches ‘of the apostles’ 681.
and St. Mary Major, adds that he was buried in St. Peter’s,
January 10,681. A fearsome‘ plague had devastated Rome
during the summer of 680, and it is possible that Agatho may
have died from its effects, direct or indirect. He is depicted
on a painting (which Gregorovius assigns to the fifteenth
Ravennze semetipsum sedi apostolicee post multorum annorum curri-
cula presentavit.” Cf Agnell. in vit. Theod., c. 4, ap. Muratori,
R. I. S., Vl. ii.; and cf Murat., Annal., vi. 368 seg.

Poe) 1) Vit. 5.) LEOn LT

2 See, however, under Pope Constantine, etc.

3 Jaffé (Regest. Ponti.) quotes an interesting decree of Agatho’s,
addressed to all bishops, to the effect that “all the decrees of the
Apostolic See were to be received as confirmed by the voice of Blessed
Peter himself.” “Sic omnes apostolicze sedis sanctiones accipiendz
sunt, tanquam ipsius d. Petri voce firmatz sint.” This fragment is to

be found in the ‘ decrees’ of Ivo and Gratian.
4 “Qualis nec temporibus aliorum pontificum fuisse memoratur”

Wer):

48 ST. AGATHO

century) on the walls of St. Peter ‘ad Vincula, as taking
part in a procession for the cessation of the pestilence.
His epitaph, commonplace enough, ran as follows:

Pontificalis apex virtutum pondere fultus
Ut jubar irradiat, personat ut tonitrus.

Quz monet hoc peragit, doctrine fomes et auctor ;
Format enim gestis quos docet eloquiis.

Dum simul eequiparet virtus et culmen honoris,
Officium decorat moribus, arte gerit.

Preeditus his meritis antistes summus Agatho
Sedis apostolicee foedera firma tenet.

En pietas, en prisca fides! insignia patrum
Intemerata manent nisibus, alme, tuis.

Quis vero dinumeret morum documenta tuarum,
Formula virtutum dum tua vita foret ??

1 Gregorovius, Rome in the Middle Ages, ii. 167-8 ; Ciampini, Vez.
VWonument., p. ii., C. 17, p. 116.

® Ap. Grisar, Azalect., i. 126; Duchesne, LZ. P., i. 358.

SHleeiek Ors

A.D. 682-683.

—— $——-

Sources.—The LZ. P. Some half dozen letters in connection
with the Sixth Council.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA,
Constantine Pogo- _ Perctarit (second time), Theodore, 677-687.

natus, 668-685. 672-688.

St. LEo II., like his predecessor, a Sicilian by birth, and
the son! of a certain Paul, though elected, according to
custom, soon after the death of Agatho, was not conse-
crated till August 17, 682, an interval of 584 days.
Probably the business of the Sixth General Council and
the negotiations carried on by the papal legates to obtain
freedom from imperial confirmation were the causes of
the emperor not confirming the election in good time.
The Book of the Popes has bestowed a very beautiful

Election
and con-
secration
of Leo.

His char-
acter and

character on this Pontiff. It depicts him as a man Of teaming.

creat eloquence, as possessed of a good knowledge of the
Scriptures, as well versed in Greek and Latin,? and in the
theory and practice of music. Not only was he learned

Wie PE:
2 7b, “Greeca, Latinaque lingua eruditus, cantilena ac psalmodia

preecipuus,” etc.
VOk, & PT.IL A

The Pope
confirms
the Sixth
General
Council.

£0 Set eouil.

himself, but he was an earnest teacher of others, and he
was at once a preacher and a doer of good works. For he
was a lover of poverty and the poor; In a word, he was
both pious and hard working. The fact that Leo is praised
for his knowledge of Greek is a further proof not only that
it was no longer the common possession of ‘society’ in
Rome, as it was in the days of Rome’s power, but that
individual knowledge of it was becoming rare in the West.
The barbarians on the one hand, and religious differences
on the other, were rapidly severing the last bonds that
united the Latin-speaking portion of the empire with the
Greek. We have already seen different popes complaining
of the difficulty of getting Greek documents translated.
The time was approaching when almost all knowledge of
it was to be lost in the West.

On his election, Leo wrote! to the emperor, probably to
notify his election and to ask the imperial confirmation.
As we saw under Pope Agatho, Constantine wrote? to the
Pope—his letter is dated December 13, 681—and sent him,
along with the letter, his approval (dated December 23,
681) of the Sixth General Council. The legates of Pope
Agatho, who were to be the bearers of these letters to
his successor, would seem to have spent the winter at
Constantinople. At any rate they did not reach Rome
till July 682. After his consecration® in the following

1 This fact is to be gathered from the end of Constantine’s letter
to the Pope.

2 Ep. ap. Mansi, xi., etc. Héfélé, Eng. ed., v. 179.

3 The Z. P, tells us that the third consecrating bishop of the Pope
was the Bishop of Velitrze, as Albano had no bishop at the time,
The other two consecrators were the bishops of Portus and Ostia.
“The Bishop of Ostia placed the Gospels on the neck, and laid his
hands on the head of the Pontiff elect, the Bishop of Albano began
the first prayer (Ades/o supplicationibus nostris), and the Bishop of
Portus the second prayer (Propitiare Domine),’ says Gregorovius
(Rome in the Middle Ages, Eng. trans., il. p. 173 note), following the

ST, LEO Il. 51

month, Leo sent off! to the emperor his confirmation of the

decrees of the Sixth Gicumenical Council some time before

the end of the year 682. He then took steps to have the Sends its
; : d t

decrees of the council published throughout the West, Spain.

and there are still extant? four of his letters which he sent

into Spain by the notary Peter. One was addressed to the

Spanish bishops in general, another to Bishop Quiricus,

one again to King Ervig (though some MSS. ascribe this

letter to Benedict II.), and another to Count Simplicius.

These four letters are practically all to the same effect.
Leo knows that those to whom he is writing are anxious
about the purity of the faith, for which the apostolic See,
the mother of all the churches, has ever toiled, and for
which it would be ready to suffer the last extremities
rather than see it defiled. He then tells of the doings of
the council at Constantinople, at which there were bishops
from all the world,4 what was defined and who were
condemned. He explains most carefully that Honorius
was condemned for not at once extinguishing the flames
of heresy, as became his apostolical authority, but for rather
fanning them by carelessness. He sends the ‘definitions’
of the council and one or two of the letters in connection
with the council; that is, such portions of the acts as had
up to that time been translated into Latin. In his letter
old ‘ordos’ in Mabillon, etc. It may be observed that practically the
same is done at the consecration of any bishop at the present day,
Cf. Pontificale Romanum and sup.

1 Cf. sup. 46. 2 Ap. Mansi, xi., etc.

3 “Pro qua (Christiana religione) haec sancta Ecclesiarum omnium
mater apostolica sedes usque ad victimam desudavit semper et
desudat ....” (Ep. ad Epp. Hisp.)

4 “Episcopis ex totius mundi partibus aggregatis,” 2d.

5 “Qui (Honorius) flammam heretici dogmatis, non ut decuit
apostolicam auctoritatem, incipientem extinxit sed negligendo con-
fovit,” 2d. ; and his letter to King Ervig: “Qui (Honorius) immacu-
latam apostolicze traditionis regulam, quam a preedecessoribus suis
accepit, maculari consensit.”

Leo and
the Church
of
Ravenna.

Leo asa
church-
builder,

52 ST. (LEO 1

to the bishops he exhorts them to subscribe the decrees of
the synod.

The result of these letters was the fourteenth council *
of Toledo, which met in November 684, and which heartily
accepted the faith of the Sixth G£cumenical Council.

Mention has already 2 been made of how Leo obtained
from Constantine the revocation ot the decree of Constans
II., making the bishops of Ravenna ‘ autocephalous.’

Before speaking of the Pope’s death, mention has now
only to be made of the fact that he dedicated (February 22,
683) to St. Paul a church, which he built near that of
St. Bibiana, and in which he placed the relics of many
martyrs. He also built,3 near the ‘velum aureum, a church
which he dedicated to SS. Sebastian and George—the
Church of St. George in Velabro, a church of great interest
to Englishmen, as it was the titular church of the late
venerated Cardinal Newman. It is close to the arch
of Janus Quadrifrons and the Cloaca Maxima. “The
building of Leo II. (the entrance hall is of later date)
still preserves its original outlines, and is a small basilica
of three naves, with sixteen ancient granite or marble
columns. Scarcely any other church within the city
is so pervaded by the atmosphere of early Christian
times. The original form of the church—that of a
basilica—its simplicity, its sculptures, its inscriptions,
some of them in Greek, dating from the first centuries
of Christianity, its air of spell-bound tranquillity, its
situation in the valley between the Capitol and the
Palatine, hallowed by so many historic associations, com-

1 Mansi, xi. Heéfélé, “st. of the Councils, v. p. 215, Eng. trans.

2 Swp., p. 47. The Pope on his side, by a decree, still preserved
in the archives of the Roman Church in the days of ‘ Anastasius,’
abolished the money payment that used to be made when the
archbishops of Ravenna received the pall. ZL. P.

DIG ES

Shee EO. 11. 53

bine to form a powerful impression on the mind of the
beholder.”?!
Leo was buried in St. Peter’s, July 3, 683. According Death of
A : Leo, 683.
to Butler,? he is commemorated asa saint in the Roman
and other martyrologies on the 28th of June. For on that

day his body was translated (688) into the church proper
Ol St Peter”

1 Gregorovius, il. pp. 171-2.
2 Lives of the Saints, vi. 343. Cf Acta SS. Boll., 23 Jun., v. p.
375

3 Jaffe, sb. an,

ST BEN ED ees ee

A.D. 684-685.

—_-—_§———_.

Source.—The-‘life’ in the Z. P.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Constantine Pogo- Perctarit (second Theodore, 677-687.

natus, 668-685. time), 672-688.

Consecrae AFTER another long interval — over eleven months —

tion of
Benedict,
684.

His
character,

Benedict II.,a Roman, the son of one John, was consecrated
June 26, 684. He had served the Church from his infancy,
and both as a youth and a priest, says his biographer,’ had
shown himself worthy of his name.

For in him abounded the grace of heavenly ‘ benediction.’
Like his predecessor he was skilled in the sacred Scrip-
tures and in music. He was also a lover of poverty,
humble and gentle, patient and generous. What matter
for regret that the pontiffs of this period, with the charming
characters which history has handed them down as possess-
ing, should have reigned for such short periods, and that
the records of their deeds should occupy such little space
in the world’s history !

17,.P. “Sesic ... exhibuit, ut decet virum suo nomine dignum,
in quo vere supernee benedictionis gratia redundavit.”

ST. BENEDICT II. 55

Mention has already been made of the formalities which The

3 7 9 3 ublication
preceded the consecration of a pope in the days when imperial 6 the

confirmation, direct, or indirect through the exarch, had to ee
be awaited before the consecration could take place. The
formulas used for the despatch of the necessary business
in connection with the affair were given at the same time.
The ‘liberation’ decree of Constantine the Bearded
necessitated the drawing up of fresh formulas. It was,
of course, necessary to send information to the emperor
as to the result of the papal elections, even if his consent
to the papal consecration had now no longer to be asked
Hence in the Lzder Diurnus we find another set of forms
(82-85) in connection with the election of a new pope.
In the construction of the new forms the old ones were not
unnaturally brought into requisition. Consequently many
portions of the new productions are like the old ones.
There is, however, this important difference between the
two sets. There is no request for confirmation in the new
forms. Many of the phrases of these new forms point.
to the conclusion that they were drawn up for Benedict II.
The Sixth General Council (681) is alluded to as recently
(nuper) over; and Constantine (IV.) the Bearded (t+Sep-
tember 685) is still spoken of in them as alive. We
may suppose that these formulas were in use to proclaim
the election of the new pope till the compact of 817
between the Papacy and the new empire in the West.
The first of the formulas (82) is described as Decretum
Pontificis. It is the decree of election which, duly signed
by WV., humble priest of the Holy Roman Church, and
all the clergy, nobility and soldiery (or honourable citizens),
was deposited in the archives’ of the Lateran. After

1“ {oc decretum .... in arcivo domine nostrz sanctz Romanz
ecclesiz, scilicet in sacro Lateranensi scrinio.... recondi fecimus,”

f. 82.

56 ST. BENEDICT II.

a preamble about the goodness of God in turning their
sorrow for the death of their late pastor into joy for the
new one He has given them, the decree records how,
after long prayers for heavenly guidance, all met together,
and, on account of his merits, unanimously elected the
deacon (Benedict).

Before his consecration the new Pope-elect made a
public profession of faith—J/ndiculum Pontificis, formula 83.
He declared that even to death would he guard the faith
given by Jesus Christ, and handed down to him by the
successors of St. Peter. He professed his adhesion to the
doctrines of the Blessed Trinity and the Incarnation, and
the other doctrines of God’s Church, as they have been
unfolded (commendata) by the cecumenical councils, the
constitutions of the popes, and the writings of the approved
fathers (probatissimorum doctorum) of the Church. With
the other general councils he acknowledged the sixth,
lately (xuper) called together by his predecessor Agatho,
under the Emperor Constantine ‘of pious memory.’!
Particularly would he stand by the decrees of his pre-
decessors; preserve the discipline, rites and goods of
the Church, and never alter the ¢vadition he had received
from those who had gone before him. The profession
was signed with his own hand by the Pope-elect.

When consecrated, the new Pope announced (form. 84)
his accession “to the whole people of God, his most
reverend brethren and most well-beloved children.” He
would beg the prayers of all to assist his unworthiness,
would guard the faith (which is professed at considerable
length), and condemn those whom the councils had con-
demned, viz., Sergius, Paul, etc., “along with Honorius, who

1 This phrase shows that Constantine IV. was then dead; and so
that in this form this particular formula could not have been used at
Benedict’s election.

ST. BENEDICT II, 57

gave encouragement to their profane doctrines.” A copy of
this public profession of his faith, also signed by the Pope’s
own hand, was deposited in the confession of St. Peter.

The last of the formulas in question (85) takes the form
of a homily addressed by the Pope to the faithful assembled
in St. Peter's on the day of his consecration. After an
exhortation to Christian peace, it concludes with a pro-
fession of faith, like those of the preceding formulas, and
with prayers for the prosperity of the empire.

As no Spanish bishops had been present at the Roman Beneret
council under Pope Agatho, we saw how earnest Pope St. faith of
Leo II. was to inform them of the definitions of the Sixth
General Council, and to secure their adhesion to them.

St. Benedict followed in his footsteps, and one of his first
acts, though only “a priest, and in God’s name the elect!
of the Holy See,” was to send a letter? to the notary Peter,
urging him to fulfil to the best of his ability the commands
of St. Leo, “and procure with all zeal the subscriptions
of the bishops to the decisions of the Council.” Whether
or not in consequence of greater activity on Peter’s part,
King Ervig summoned? the fourteenth council of Toledo

1 From this letter and from his decrees in behalf of St. Wilfrid
(ap. Eddius), it is plain that the government of the Church was now
in the hands of the Pope ‘elect, during the vacancy of the Holy
See, and not, as before, in the hands of the archpriest, etc. (see
above, Pt. I. 354). In the absence of the Pope, the Roman Church
continued to be governed by the ‘three,’ the archpriest, etc., till the
days of Pope Zachary. Cf Cenni, Diss. V., ap. Zaccaria, Raccolt. di
Diss., t. xviii. We may account for decrees running in the name of
‘Benedict elect,’ by supposing they were issued after the reception of
Constantine’s edict of privilege, and before his consecration; and
that previous to Benedict’s reception of Constantine’s charter of
exemption from imperial confirmation, the Church was governed as
before by the ‘triumvirate’; or perhaps, what is simpler, the
emperor's consent—never known to have been refused—was taken for
granted.

2 Ap. Mansi, xi., 1085, etc.

3 Cf. the Acts of the Council, ap. Mansi, etc. Heéfélé, v. 215, Eng.

ao ST. BENEDICT II.

(November 684). The council discussed the business for
which, in accordance with the papal letters, they had been
assembled. Monothelism was condemned. St. Julian,
the Archbishop of Toledo, who presided at the council,
drew up in its name and sent to the Pope an ‘ Apol-
ogy’ of their faith (Lider Responstonis fidet nostre seu
Apologia). It was sent to Rome by the notary Peter,
and consisted of four parts.2 The document itself is
now lost. Benedict was not satisfied with some of the
phrases used by the Spanish bishops in their ‘ Apology.’
He did not care for the expression: “will begot will,”
or that there were “three substances in Christ,” and he
accordingly sent back the ‘Apology’ for revision.* At
another council of Toledo (the fifteenth), at which both
bishops and nobles took part, and which met May II,
688, the Spanish bishops defended the expressions the
Pope had complained of. They explained them in an
orthodox sense, and urged that similar phrases were used

trans. “Nos... . cause hujus ordinem, et totius rei negotia
retexentes, quibus Romanz sedis fueramus literis invitati,” etc.

1 This document is alluded to in the fourth canon of the fourteenth
council. That it was written by St. Julian is known from his ‘life’
by Felix, fl. 693, Bishop of Toledo (Ap. Bolland. 4. SS. ad diem
Mart. 8). Cf. also the acts of the fifteenth council discussing this
document.

2 Cf. acts of the fifteenth council of Toledo. Héfélé, v. 217 seg.

3 Cf De rebus Hisp., iii. 13, of Roderic Ximenes, who was
Archbishop of Toledo from 1208-1245. The archbishop is not
accurate in making Benedict receive the second apology of St. Julian.
Cf. the acts of the fifteenth council, from which it is clear that
Benedict was dead when that council met. “Ad illa nos illico
convertimus contuenda capitula, pro quibus muniendis ante hoc
biennium (?) deate memorie Romanus papa Benedictus nos literarum
suarum significatione monuerat.” As the fifteenth council of Toledo,
which uses these words, was held in 688, and Pope Benedict II. died
in 685, the word ‘biennium’ presents a chronological difficulty that
seems to have escaped the notice of Héfélé and other writers. It

may be supposed that we should read ‘triennium’ or ‘quadriennium’
for ‘biennium.

ST. BENEDICT II. 59

by the fathers. And, nettled apparently at being con-
sidered heterodox even in language, they concluded their
defence of their first ‘Apology’ with the tart remark
that they would not dispute with any who chose to
dissent from their doctrine, founded as it was on that
of the fathers ; and that if their doctrine seemed objection-
able to ignorant rivals, it would seem, they modestly add,
‘sublime’ to lovers of truth! However, St. Julian drew
up a second Apology and sent it to Rome in charge of
some very learned men. This was accepted as orthodox
by Pope Sergius.

This Pope seems to have had as good an understanding
with Constantine the Bearded as his predecessors. He

1 Cf. Roderic, «bz sup., where at the close we should read Sergius for
Benedictus. As some writers see in every act of disrespect or rebellion
against the Holy See, not merely an isolated act of disobedience but an
indication of complete independence of the authority of Rome, it is to
the point to repeat that at this period the whole West acknowledged
the spiritual supremacy and jurisdiction of the Bishops of Rome. With
regard to Spain in particular sufficient has already been said of its
relations towards the Popes to make it obvious that it was no exception
to the rule. We will, however, add one more voice to the chorus we
have already heard speaking of the spiritual position of Spain. It is an
authoritative one, and uttered on a solemn occasion. It is the voice
of Spain’s king; and it was spoken when trying to convert another
Teutonic ruler, the Lombard Adalwald, from Arianism. To him wrote,
in language more lengthy and, at times, more fervent than clear, the
Visigothic monarch Sisebut (+620). He explained to his would-be
convert that his faith must be founded on the rock against which the
winds and rains of error will break in vain ; and that, in consequence
of the words of Our Lord—S. Mat. xvi. 18, no one can be held blame-
less unless he maintain the apostolic profession in its entirety. He
then told him that that profession was the one which the Roman
Church had received from the Apostles and gave to those who rightly
sought it. “Clare lucideque permonuit (doctor gentium), unam
ad cultum venerationis esse confessionem credentium, quam sequax
ecclesia ab apostolis traditam Romana suscepit et recte petentibus,
hereticorum segitibus extirpatis, maternis effectibus tradidit” (Ep.
Sis. ap. 47. G. Epp. iii. 674). Thisywas the belief of the Visigoths
till their national extinction.

Obtains
full free-
dom (?) for
the con-
secration
of the
Popes, 684.

‘60 ST. BENEDICT II.

obtained! a decree from that just prince that the Pope-elect
might be consecrated at once, without having to wait for
any imperial confirmation.

It has already been noted that the question with regard
to the confirmation of papal elections by emperor or exarch
is a most complicated one. The meaning of this decree of
684 or 5 is, as previously stated, disputed.” According to
some, in doing away with confirmation by the emperor it
substituted that by the exarch, while others contend that
by it all necessity of applying to any secular authority for
confirmation was abrogated. Certainly that is the more
obvious meaning of the decree, and is the one maintained
by those who hold that the exarch had confirmed papal
elections before the year 684. The supporters of this view,
however, have further to suppose either that this decree
was modified almost immediately after its publication, or
that, when in the Book of the Popes there is mention in
the life of Conon (687) of a customary deputation to the
exarch after Conon’s election, it is only meant that thereby
official notice of the accession of the new Pope was given
to the imperial government. While, therefore, it is clear
that the decree of Constantine effected some change in the
existing custom as to imperial confirmation of papal
elections, the reader must decide for himself what he
supposes that custom to have been.

Whether we consider the princes who arrogate to them-
selves this right of confirming the election of the popes or
the candidates for the sacred office of supreme pastor of
Christendom, it must be confessed that, generally speaking,

1 “Hic suscepit divales jussiones clementissimi Constantini magni
principis ad venerabilem clerum et populum, atque felicissimum exer-
citum Romane civitatis, per quas concessit, ut persona qui electus
fuerit ad sedem Apost. e vestigio absque tarditate ordinetur.” Z. P.

* Vide sup., Pt. 1. p. 40 and p. 354 f.

ST. BENEDICT IL 61

the interference of the secular power in these elections can
only be fraught with evil ; and this, if only on the general
principle of the detrimental effect produced on any business
or corporate body when outside influence can be brought
to bear unduly on its concerns or deliberations. The
door is at once opened to bribery and corruption of ail
sorts. Certainly the history of the Church has proved this
abundantly. When secular influence in the papal elections
has been greatest, the rulers of the Church have been the
most indifferent. The Papacy was never at a lower ebb
than it was in the tenth century, and the interference of
the powerful in papal affairs never greater.
Constantine gave the Pope another proof of his regard Engen
for him. He would have the Pope adopt his two sons, cous made
Justinian and Heraclius. This he effected by sending adopted

: a children of
locks of their hair (szallones)* to the Pope, who received the Pope,

them in State accompanied by the clergy and the ‘army, es
z.é., the commanders ot the army. In the early Middle
Ages,” it was the custom that those who first cut the hair
of children, or to whom such first-cut tresses were sent,
adopted the said children. Muratori* thinks that this act
would also signify the submission and obedience which
kings professed towards the successors of St. Peter, after
the manner of slaves, whose hair used to be cut. And he
quotes the famous Anastasius,* who tells of a king of the
Bulgarians, in his devotion to the Holy See, with his own
hand cutting off his hair and handing it to the legates of
the Pope, saying : “ Know ye, nobles and people of Bulgaria,

1 Z, P. in vit.; Muratori (Azmal., ad an. 684) notes that the word
‘malloni’ is still in use in the Modenese dialect.

2. Cf. Paul. Diac., vi. 53.

3 Annal., ad an. 684.

4 Prefat. ad Comcil., vili.. ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 129, p. 20. ‘“ Omnes
primates et cuncti populi Bulgarorum terra cognoscant, ab hodierno
die me servum fore post Deum b, Petri et ejus vicarii.”

Macarius,
ex-bishop
of Antioch,
685.

Favours
for the
clergy.

62 ST. BENEDICT It.

that from this day forth I am the servant, after God, of
Blessed Peter and his vicar!”

_ It may be remembered that Pope St. Leo II. failed to
make any impression on Macarius of Antioch and his
heterodox views. On the death of Theophanes (685 ?),
who was appointed to fill the See of Antioch in place of
Macarius, Benedict made an effort to induce the heretical
bishop to subscribe to the orthodox faith, with a view oi}
having him restored to his See. For forty days the Pope
caused Macarius! to be visited by one of his special advisers
(constliartus). But Macarius died, as he had lived, in
obstinate heresy.

A brief list of this Pope’s church restorations may be read
in the Lzber Pontificalis. He was very good to the clergy.
The Book of the Popes notes three classes who received the
last dying gifts of the Pope, viz. the various orders of the
secular clergy, the monasteries which were deaconries
(monasteria diaconte), and the manstonarii or lay sacristans.
From the letters of Gregory the Great,’ it is clear that
there were deaconries not only in Rome but in other cities
as well, and that their object was to distribute corn and
other necessaries of life to the needy and to look after the
poor generally. Evidently some at least of the deaconries
were monasteries, and some of them were presided over
by monks. The one who presided over the deaconry was
known as its adzspensator; and so the recent (1900-1) ex-
cavations in the forum have brought to light an inscription
of one Theodotus, primzcertus defensorum, and adispensator
of the deaconry of St. Maria Antiqua. Whether or not
there was at this period more than one deaconry to each

1 Act. i., Conc. Gen., vii., ap Mansi, etc. ; Migne, 2d., p. 227.

ai. 25 (28) 3x. 8 (21); xi, 17 (27) 5 at, BeueO) “Pentar
quod annonas atgue consuetudines diaconi@ .... eminentia vestra

substraxerit,” x. 8; “Te Johannem religiosum ... . mensis
pauperum et exhibendee diaconiz elegimus praeponendum,” xi. 17,

ST. BENEDICT fi. 63

region is not known. Under Hadrian I. (772-795) two
more were added to the sixteen he found already in
existence, scattered, in irregular proportion, throughout
the different regions.

After then, in accordance with custom, bestowing various peat of
enedict

favours on the clergy ou Easter Day, March 26, of 685, he I.
fell ill} and died a short time after, He was buried (May
8, 685)? in St. Peter’s,

His epitaph ran as follows (Duchesne, LZ. P., i. 365).

Magna tuis, Benedicte pater, monumenta relinquis
Virtutum titulos, O decus atque dolor!

Fulguris in specimen mentis splendore coruscas
Plura sed exiguo tempore ccepta fluunt.

Cuncta sacerdotum preestantia munia comples
Et quo quisque bono claruit unus habes.

Quippe quod a parvo meritis radiantibus auctus
Jure patrum solium pontificale foves.

Non hoc ambitio rapti tibi preestat honoris

~ Indolis est fructus quam comitatur honos.

Et quia sollerter Christi regis agmina pastor
Percipe salvati preemia celsa gregis.

The jure patrum would seem to imply that it was
after passing regularly through the various degrees of
the clerical state that he at length reached the rank of
supreme pontiff.

1 The custom of bestowing money on the clergy on Easter morn,
which is known to have been practised by St. Gregory I. (in vit Joan.
Diac., ii. 25), was continued, at least, till the thirteenth century.

2 Cf Acta SS. Boll. 7 Mai, vol. ii. 197—the day on which he is
commemorated in the Roman Martyrology.

Election
and con-
secration,
July 685.

SORANGN,
A.D. 635-686.
0

Source—The ZL. P. is practically our only authority for the
short life of this Pope.

EMPERORS OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.

Constantine Pogonatus, Perctarit, 672-688. | Theodore, 677-687.
668-685 (Sept.).

Justinian IT. (Rhinot-
metus), 685-695.

NOTHING very important marks the reign of John, the
Syrian, of the province of Antioch, the son of Cyriacus.
As a deacon! he was one of those who represented the
See of Rome at the Sixth General Council. Elected some
time between May and the close of July, he was conse-
crated (July 23, 685) by the bishops of the same three Sees
that consecrated his predecessor—viz., Portus, Ostia and
Velitre. We may suppose for the same reason, viz., the
vacancy of the See of Albano. In his election there was,
as the Liber Ponttficalis expressly informs us, a reversion

17,P. “Hic... . repreesentans locum apostolic sedis in sancta
synodo,” etc. “Vir valde strenuus, atque scientia praeditus, et omnino
moderatus.” John must also have been very generous, for

the Z. P. assures us that he gave 1goo solidi to the clergy,
monasteries, and mansionaril, or those who looked after the churches.

JOHN V. 65

to the earlier mode of proceeding in the matter of electing
the popes. Elected! by the people ‘at large’ in the Church
of St. John Lateran, John was thence taken to the adjoining
palace and enthroned at once, without having to wait for
any imperial confirmation. This was, of course, in virtue
of the decree of Constantine just obtained by Benedict IT. ;
though, as we have seen, not a few authors of repute hold
that his election had been confirmed by the exarch in
the emperor’s stead.

1 John V. is the first Pope of the Middle Ages the method of whose
election is mentioned in the Z. P. As a help to the student to form
his own conclusions as to the manner of electing popes in the Middle
Ages, we will bring together the scant notices in the Z. P. from John V.
to Leo III. inclusive.

John V.—“A generalitate in Ecclesia Salvatoris electus est.”

Conon.—“ Sacerdotes et clerus unanimiter elegerunt (Cononem). E
vestigio autem omnes judices una cum Primatibus exercitus pariter ad
ejus salutationem venientes, in ejus laude omnes simul acclamaverunt.
(Demum) videns exercitus unanimitatem cleri, populique, et ipsi
consenserunt in persona preedicti viri.” (An important passage.)

Sergius J.—“ Primates judicum, et exercitus Romanz militiz vel cleri
plurima pars et przesertim sacerdotum atque civium multitudo, ..
in personam Sergii concordantes se contulerunt.”

Gregory III.—“ Quem (Greg.) viri Romani seu omnes populi
elegerunt.”

Stephen IT, —“Stephanum....cunctus populus sibi elegit, et
intra Lateranense patriarchium misit.”

Stephen I77.—“Cunctus Dei populus .. . . congregatus est intra
basilicam S. Die Genitricis ad Presepe. Ubi et omnes miseri-
cordiam Dei petentes (Stephanum) sibi eligunt. Quem omnes cum
laudis preconiis in basilicam Salvatoris, deportaverunt, et exinde intus
venerunt et in Patriarchium juxta morem intromiserunt.” (Another
important passage.)

St. Paul I.—“Plurima pars judicum et populi.... quoniam
(pars) validior et fortior erat (Paulum) elegerunt.”

Stephen IV.—“Christophorus .... aggregans ‘in tribus Fatis’
sacerdotes ac primates cleri, et optimates militiz atque universum
exercitum et cives honestos, omnisque populi Romani ccetum. .
(Stephanum) elegerunt. Quem et cum vocibus acclamationum in
Lateranense deportaverunt patriarchium.”

Leo I7I1.—“A cunctis sacerdotibus seu proceribus et omni clero,
necnon et optimatibus, vel cuncto populo Romano, (Leo) electus est.”

VOL. I. PT. IL 5

The
Church of
Sardinia.

Death ot
Pope John,
Aug. 686,

66 JOHN V.

John V. is set down by his biographer as a man of
great energy and learning, but withal as a very moderate
man. This last exceptional good quality may account,
to some extent at any rate, for the success of John’s
dealings with the Emperor Constantine. His biographer
attributes to his exertions, while at Constantinople, the
obtaining of imperial rescripts from Constantine, by
which the taxes that had to be paid by the ‘ patrimonies’
of the Church in Sicily and Calabria, and other imposts
that weighed very heavily on the See of Rome, were
reduced.

The step of the greatest moment taken by this Pope,
at least so far as history has recorded his doings, was his
action in bringing back the Church of Sardinia to his
direct jurisdiction. This direct jurisdiction the popes had
handed over, at least to some extent, to the archiepiscopal
See of Cagliari. Pope Martin I. had, however, to withdraw
this concession, as it was being abused. Notwithstanding
this, Citonatus, the Archbishop of Cagliari, without asking
any permission of the Pope, calmly consecrated Novellus
for the See of Torres (Turris Libisonis, now Porto di
Torre). To this insolence the Pope replied by summoning
a council, and by a special bull, which in the days of the
Pope’s biographer was still to be found in the archives of
the Roman Church, placed Novellus-under the immediate
jurisdiction of the Holy See?

After a long illness, and so severe a one that he could

1 For it appears from the letters of St. Gregory I. (xiii. 21, al. x. 17)
that the bishops of Sardinia had to come to Rome to be consecrated.
Speaking of the election of two bishops—one to this very See of Turris,
in the south of the island near Sassari—he writes: ‘ Qui dum fuerint
postulati, cum sollemnitate decreti omnium subscriptionibus roborati

.. ad nos sacrandi occurant.”

2 The Z. P. is our authority for all this. “Antiquitus ordinatio fuit
sedis apostolicae, et ad tempus concessa fuerat ipsa ordinatio eidem
Ecclesize (Caralitanze),”

JOHN V. 67

scarce perform the customary ordinations, Pope John died
in 686, and was buried in St. Peter’s (August 2).

From the short reigns of the popes of this period, we
can only conclude that it must have been usual then to
elect very old men. Indeed, the age of Conon and
Severinus is especially mentioned, as are the great
infirmities of Agatho, John, etc. And if there is any truth
in the conjecture of some, that Pope Agatho was no other
than the Agatho about whom Pope St. Gregory I. wrote to
Urbicus, the abbot of the monastery of St. Hermes at
Palermo, he must, as we have already noted, have been a
centenarian when he became pope.

In John’s epitaph, of which we quote a few lines, his Epitaph.
position at the Sixth General Council as Agatho’s legate is
commemorated.

Hic et in extremis sollers fidusque minister
Claruit et primus jure levita fuit.

Missus ad imperium vice presulis extitit auctor,
Hunc memorant synodus pontificisque tomus.

(Duchesne, P. Z.,i. 367.)

1 St. Peter Damian wrote a little pamphlet, Om the Shortness of the
Lives of the Roman Pontiffs (Opusc., 23, ap. P. L., t. 145, p. 471 f.).
The first reason he assigns for this fact is that the brief reigns of the
popes may impress the human race with the fear of death. For the
death of kings does not produce the same effect. There are so many
of them. And when one of them dies only his own kingdom is in
distress ; but when a Pope dies the whole world is in grief, because the
whole world knows him and is interested in him. The Saint also con-
cludes that, because kings often die by the sword, people are less affected
by the news of their death than they are by that of the Pope who dies
by the ordinary laws of nature. At any rate God wishes that men
should draw benefit as well from the deaths as from the lives of the
popes—ideas characteristic of an age the very antithesis of our own,
which looked outside the natural for explanations of everything. No
doubt the unhealthiness of Rome during the Middle Ages was one of
the principal reasons of the fact in question. Innocent III. used to
say it was hard to’find a man of forty, impossible to find one of sixty
in Rome. Cf. Burn, Rome and the Campagna, p. 444.

Conon is
elected
after a
division,

CONON.

A.D. 686-687.

——_—_ 0 —

Source.—The ZL. P.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCHS OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Justinian IT. Perctarit, 672-688. Theodore, 677-687.
(685-695, first time.) John Platyn,! 687-702.

(705-711, second time.)

ON the death of John V. there was disunion among the
electors on the question of his successor. The clergy
favoured the archpriest Peter, the army the priest
Theodore. ‘As the gates.of the Lateran basilica were in
the hands of the soldiers, the clergy had to meet outside
that noble church. The leaders of the army held their
assemblies in the curious circular church of St. Stephen,
with its very striking, if not very beautiful, frescoes. After
message after message had passed to no purpose between
the two parties, the clergy at length, entering the Lateran
palace, unanimously elected Conon. The grey hairs? and '

1 It is clear from the Z. P, in vit. Conon. that John had succeeded
Theodore before the death of Pope Conon.

27. P. in vit. “In quo (Conone) vere aspectus angelicus, vener-
anda canities, sermo verus, provecta zetas, simplex animus, quieti
mores, religiosa vita, qui se nunquam aliquando in causis, actibusque
seecularibus commiserat.”

CONON 69

the angelic beauty of Conon, combined with the well-
known beauty of his character—his candour, his simplicity,
his piety, his freedom from secular concerns—produced
a powerful impression. The judges and. the military
commanders at once recognised Conon, and offered the
usual salutation and acclamation.1 Some think that Conon
was a soldier’s son, and that this had some weight in the
eyes of the military. They suppose that the remark
of ‘Anastasius, that Conon was “oriundus ex patre
Thraceseo,” does not mean that he was born in Thrace, or
that his father’s name was Thraceseus, but that he was a
son of an officer of the Thracesian troop.2 Wherever he
was born, Conon had been educated in Sicily. He after-
wards came to Rome and was ordained priest.

When the rank and file of the army saw the unanimity
of the clergy and their own leaders, they also acknowledged
Conon after a delay of a few days. Then, in conjunction
with the ‘clergy and people,’ they sent off to the exarch
Theodore notice of the election of Conon ‘according to
custom.’ 8

As to the meaning of these words of the Book of the
Popes, enough has already been said. It may therefore
suffice to remind the reader that those who believe that
Constantine Pogonatus gave absolute freedom of choice
to the electors of the popes think that this notice in
the life of Conon merely signifies that official documents
were sent to the exarch, as the emperor’s representative,
to let him know who the new pope was. The opponents
of this view maintain, on the contrary, that the documents

1“Judices unacum Primatibus exercitus ad ejus salutationem
venientes, in ejus laude omnes acclamaverunt” (Z. /. in vit.).

2 Cf. Duchesne’s edit. of the Léber Pontif.; and Hodgkin, //aly and
her Invaders, Vi. p. 351 note. me

3 “ Missos una cum clericis, et ex populo ad excellentissimum
Theodorum exarchum, ut mos est (exercitus) direxerunt.” ~Z, P.

‘The elec-
tors of
the popes
at this
period.

70 CONON

were sent to seek for the exarch’s confirmation of the
election. Certain it is, at any rate, that the interval
between the election and consecration of a pope now
becomes uniformly shorter than before, and that Conon
was consecrated October 21, 686.

Mention has already been made of the mode of electing
the popes from the third to the ninth century, and of those
who had the right of election. It was then stated that
throughout those ages the right of electing the popes
lay with the clergy and people. However, as at this
period there is frequent mention of the ‘army’ as a sort
of third electing body, it will be convenient here to add
a few more remarks on the same subjects. We are of
opinion that the distinction between the ‘army’ and the
‘people, at the period of which we are now treating, is
more apparent than real. Just as in the days of the
Roman republic, the ‘people, except the youths and old
men, were the ‘army.’ During the ‘Decline’ of the
empire the Roman ‘people, by the wholesale intro-
duction of conquered nations into the forces of the
empire, and the disinclination of ‘Roman citizens’ to
serve in the army,became a class quite separate from an
army composed, for the most part, of foreigners. Hence
in the first centuries the popes were said to be elected
by the clergy and people. After the ‘Fall’ of the
empire, the inhabitants of Rome—Romans we cannot
now call them—had to look to themselves for protec-
tion against enemies from without. The emperors at
Constantinople were unable to send troops for the
protection of the old capital of the Roman empire.
Consequently the ‘people’ of Rome had again to
become soldiers, and by the close of the seventh century
it would seem that ‘the people, ‘the citizens’ (honestz
cives) were completely organised ; and, with the universal

CONON 71

exception of youths and old men, were all soldiers, were
the ‘army.’ Hence in the Leber Pontificalis mention is
made sometimes (generally indeed from the close of the
seventh century) of the ‘clergy,! army and people, and
sometimes of the ‘clergy and army.’ After what has
been said as a proviso, it may be correct to speak of
the ‘three electoral bodies’? that took part in papal
elections in the earlier Middle Ages. From all this, it
may be concluded with Mabillon,? that the order of
electing and consecrating the popes before the eleventh
century was as follows. First they were elected by the
clergy; then followed the salutation and acclamation of

1 Cf L.P. in vit. S. Bened. II., where Constantine’s decree about
the elections of the popes is addressed to the ‘clergy, people and
army’ on the one hand; and where, on the other, only the ‘clergy
and army’ are spoken of as receiving the ‘locks of hair’ of the
emperors’ sons. And so the Lzder Diurnus, f. 61, speaks of the “ viros
honestos cives, et de exercitali gradu,” and says that the “clerus,
optimates et milites seu cives” sign the act of election, where ‘seu’
means azd, and ‘optimates’ marks out the nobler citizens. And in the
life of Pope Valentine (A.D. 827), mention is only made of the clergy and
the people with their more distinguished representatives. ‘“ Collectis
igitur in unum .... episcopis, et... . proceribus, omnique....
populo” (Z. P.). Later on in the same life, Valentine is said to have
been elected by the people, and ‘both branches of the military
service,’ viz., imperial and local. “Almz plebis et letis utriusque
militie Romanorum electus est vocibus.”

2 Where in the Lzber Diurnus the election of the popes in the
seventh century is described, the different classes mentioned as taking
part in it may be reduced to three, viz., the clergy, the army, and the
people, viz., the old and young; for the other classes mentioned are
only subdivisions of these three. “Convenientibus nobis (i) cunctis
sacerdotibus ac proceribus ecclesiz et universo clero, atque (ii)
optimatibus et universa militari preesentia, seu civibus honestis, et
(iii) cuncta generalitate populi.” Cf Gregorovius, Astory of the
City of Rome in the Middle Ages, ii. 176-178. The ‘proceres,’ or
‘primates’ cleri, were the officials of the papal court, such as the
Primicerius and Secundicerius of the Notaries, the treasurer, etc.
(Cf Cenni, Diss. V., ap. Zaccaria, Raccolta di Diss., t. xviii.).

3 Comment. in Ord. Rom., § 18, ap. Pagi, Brev. Gest. P. R., in vit
Conon.

Justinian
II. and
the Acts
of the
Sixth
General
Council.

72 CONON

the judges and nobles, the consent of the army, and,
in fine, before the decree of Constantine IV., the
subscription of all to the notice of the election, which
was sent to the emperor (or, for a time, to the exarch)
for confirmation. When the election was confirmed, the
Pope-elect was consecrated in the basilica of St. Peter's
on the Vatican, and enthroned in the Lateran basilica.
In some cases, however, the enthronisation preceded the
consecration.

This Pope received an imperial rescript of Justinian II.,
writes ‘Anastasius, in which the emperor says that he
has recovered the acts, 2.2, the original copies, of the
Sixth General Council. This letter is still extant! in
a poor, scarcely intelligible Latin translation, and was
addressed to Pope John V., though dated February
17, 687, a circumstance which may be used to show
once again how slowly at times news travelled to
Constantinople. “We have learnt,” runs the rescript,
“that the acts (viz. the original copies) of the Sixth
CEcumenical Synod have been sent back to some of
our ‘Judges’ (judzces) who had lent them. We had not
indeed imagined that anyone would be bold enough to
keep possession of them, without our consent, for God,
of His abundant mercy, has made us the guardians of
the immaculate faith of Christ.” The rescript adds that
the emperor summoned together the patriarchs, the papal
apocrisiarius, the metropolitans and bishops who were
staying in the city, the senate, and various State officials
and officers of the various army corps, stationed in
different parts of the empire. Then he (the emperor)?

1 Ap. Mansi, xi., etc.

2 “Yussimus preefatas synodalium gestorum chartas in medium
adduci, et coram supradictis omnibus lectionem eorum fieri, omnesque
diligenter audientes signare ipsas fecimus” (Ep. Just. ad Joan. V.).

CONON 73

caused the copies of the council to be read before them,
and then caused all to sign them. The documents were
then handed over to the emperor’s care, that “it might
never be in the power of those who do not fear God,
to corrupt or change them.” This decree had been sent
to the Pope, that he might know what was being done,

This imperial letter is particularly interesting as showing
the great care taken by the ancients to preserve intact the
decrees of the general councils.

It would almost seem as if, for a time at least, some of Justinian
his father’s good feeling for the Roman See must faye ds em
found its way into the rude breast of Justinian. For, by mony
two decrees, he remitted two hundred measures (capita) ¥ reat
of corn which the ‘rectors’ (custodes) of the ‘patrimony’ in ae
Bruttium and Lucania had to pay every year; and he
ordered the serfs belonging to the same patrimony (/amzla
patrimoniz) and of Sicily, and who were held in oo
by the military, to be restored. Duchesne (L. P., i. 370)
observes that this patrimony is not expressly eeationed in
the letters of St. Gregory I. But it is clear from several
of them (Ep. ii. 3 (1); v. 9; ix. 129, 134, 110 (47, 48, 60),
etc.) that the notary Peter and the sub-deacon Sabinus,
who are spoken of in these letters, or to whom they were
actually addressed, were evidently ‘rectors’ of a ‘ patrimony’
in those parts.

Age, it appears, does not always bring that experience Conon

makes an
and prudence which is looked for from it. And so we read unfortu-
in ‘ Anastasius’ of the aged Conon neglecting to follow the 2 pare:
safe custom? of taking advice of the clergy ; being deceived ™™”
by designing men; appointing, in spite of the opposition

of his counsellors, a certain Constantine, a deacon of the

ib ghavee

2 “ Hic (Conon) ultra consuetudinem, absque consensu cleri,” etc,
. EF )

, » “hominem perversum et tergiversutum, tha dep

Conon
sends

St. Kilian
to preach
in Fran-
conia,

74 CONON

church of Syracuse, as ‘rector’ of the important ‘patri-
mony’ of Sicily, and granting him an exceptional privilege,
viz., the use of the coveted ‘mappulum’ (horse trappings
or cloth) for riding. But it was not long before this ‘sly
and wicked man’ got into trouble. His extortions raised
seditions, and the governor of the province had to step in
and send Constantine to prison. “So dangerous is it,”
moralises Pagi,! “for popes and bishops, without taking
counsel, to promote to ecclesiastical offices and dignities
men who have not been sufficiently tried. ”

If Conon got no glory from the deacon Constantine, the
same cannot be said of his connection with St. Kilian and
his companions. At the time when Conon mounted the
Throne of the Fisherman, most of Germany was still pagan,
especially in the North. Round about the Rhine, through
the action of the Franks, who had accepted Christianity in
the course of the preceding century, there were Christians,
as there were, too, in the countries Helvetia, Noricum,
Rheetia, south of the Danube—the remains of the Christian
churches which were there when the frontier of the Roman
empire was the Danube itself. And no doubt in other
parts of Germany there were Christians also, but isolated,
and in many cases infected with pagan superstitions or
with the Arian heresy. But throughout the seventh
century missionaries from the Franks, Irish, and Anglo-
Saxons brought the faith of Christ to different parts of

. Germany, and, particularly in its southern half, undermined

the power of paganism.
About the year 685 there arrived at Herbipolis, now
Wurzburg on the Maine, in Franconia, a band of mission-

1 Brev. Gest. P. R..n.7, in vit. Con. Baronius, following an inferior
MS., and thereby leading Pagi and others astray, makes Conon conse-
crate Constantine as Bishop of Antioch! Cf Muratori, Anmai., ad an.
687.

CONON 75

aries, among whom were SS. Kilian and Colman, priests,
and Totnan,a deacon. They were a division of that great
company of missionaries who left Ireland in the century
of the greatest glory of the Church in that country (the
seventh), and overran the continent of Europe, spreading
everywhere the hope-kindling faith of Christ. When the
saint and his companions arrived in Franconia among the
Eastern Franks, his biographer, who seems to: have lived
about the end of the ninth century, tells how Kilian was
greatly struck by the beauty of the country and its inhabi-
tants, but correspondingly saddened by the reflection that
they were in the power of ‘the old enemy.’ “My brothers,”
said he, “you see how charming is this land, and how fair
its people, in error though they are. If you think it well,
let us do as we decided whilst at home! Let us go to
Rome and visit the threshold (/zzua) of the Prince of the
Apostles. Let us present ourselves before the Blessed
Pope John; and then, with the advice and leave of the
Apostolic See, let us return here and preach the faith.”
To this exhortation all agreed, and betook themselves to
Rome to obtain the Pope’s sanction that they might preach
the Gospel with authority. Arrived in Rome, they found
that John V., whom they had set out to see, was dead.t

1 “Dedit illia Deo et S. P. Principe App. licentiam et potestatem

preedicandi et docendi.” Cf his ‘Life’ ‘“Eamus Romam, et praesen-
temus nos obtutibus B. P. Johannis; et si Domini voluntas sit, ab
Apostolica sede accepta licentia . . . . praedicemus illis nomen D.N. J.

Christi.” The men who gave Europe its Christianity recognised that
a ‘mission’ or leave was necessary before they could exercise the
function of preaching. They knew they had to be sew¢ by Our Lord
through His vicar on earth. If a// Christians who wished nowadays to
preach the gospel to the heathen had first to obtain the sanction of the
Pope, the scandals caused by the acts of so many so-called missionaries
would be avoided. Two ancient lives of St. Kilian are printed ap.
Acta SS., 8 Jul., ii. p. 612 f. The first and shorter life, from which are
the above quotations, dates from about the end of the ninth century ;
the second from the eleventh. Cf Butler’s Lives of the Saints, July 8. .

Death of
Conon,
687.

76 CONON

They were, however, most kindly received by the venerable
Conon, who ordained Kilian bishop, without assigning
him any particular See. Armed with the panal permission
to preach and teach, back to Wurzburg returned this
noble band, feeling strong in the mission that Christ’s
vicar had imparted to them. Great success attended
their efforts, and the Duke of Franconia himself, Gosbert,
was baptised. But when Geilana, whom Gosbert had
taken to wife, though she was the widow of his deceased
brother, learnt that Gosbert was preparing to dismiss her
at the exhortation of the missionaries, she had them
secretly slain in 689. But the work of conversion went
steadily on under the son and successor of Gosbert, and in
later times the descendants of Kilian’s converts venerated
his relics. For his biographer tells how his sacred remains
were translated to an honourable place by the joint action
of St. Boniface and Burchard, first bishop of Wurzburg,
and at the command of Pope Zachary.

After a long illness, which was so severe as almost to
prevent him from holding the usual episcopal ordinations—
a trial which is also related to have befallen his predecessor
John V.—Conon died and was buried in St. Peter’s,
September 21 (22 according to Jaffé), 687. The donation
to the clergy, which, to the same amount as his predecessor,
Conon had set aside for them, we shall see, in the life of
his successor, they never got.

Sis ie et iG oUt ie nel &

A.D 687-701.

—-)--—

Sources.—A rather longer ‘life’ in the Z. P. The exact details
given therein clearly show a contemporary author. The various
Acts of the Councils, and Héfélé, v. pp. 221-242 (Eng. trans.),
for the Quinisext or Trullan Synod.

Bede, 7. £., 1. v.; Eddius, etc., for notices of Sergius’ dealings
with this country.

EMPERORS OF THE KINGS OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST, LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Justinian II., 685-695 Perctarit, 672-688. John Platyn, 687-702.
(first time). Cunincpert, 688-700.
Leontius, 695-698. Aripert II., 700-712.
Tiberius III. (Apsimar),
698-705.

AGAIN we have to chronicle election troubles. Men Disteee
there will ever be whom the hope of ‘thirty pieces of Sergius I.
silver’ will lure on to sell their friends, their country and
their God. And, on the other hand, the temptation to
offer bribe is much intensified by the known willingness
of the person to be gained over to accept it. The sub-
sequent conduct of the exarch John Platyn will show
that he was a man with an ‘itching palm, All this the Double
archdeacon Pascal understood well. While Conon was Theadire

a
lying on his death-bed, Pascal sent off to the exarch to Pascal.

98 | ST. SERGIUS 1

promise him money, if he would secure his election as
Conon’s successor. Gold was bait enough for Platyn.
Instructions were at once issued by him to the ‘judges’
he had appointed in Rome, to make order that Pascal
should be the next Pope! Through their efforts Pascal
was accordingly elected by a certain section of the people.
It would seem, however, that he was not the first candidate
in the field. Whether Pascal’s proceedings during Conon’s
lifetime had been discovered, and good men were anxious
to thwart them, or simply because the party that had
elected the archdeacon Theodore, before Conon’s election,
were faithful to him, and very wishful that he, now archpriest,
should be Pope—at any rate, a party elected Theodore.
From the fact that his party occupied the zzterzor section
of the Lateran palace, where were the Pope’s private
apartments, it may perchance be inferred that Theodore
was first elected. Pascal held the ‘exterior’ portion? of
the palace. To explain these terms ‘interior and exterior,
we may cite the following from Duchesne (Z. P., i. 377) :—
The Lateran palace was divided into two groups of
buildings. The one to the west occupied more or less the
site of the modern palace; the one to the east, begin-
ning at the facade of St. John Lateran, extended to the
existing ‘Sancta Sanctorum.’ On the north this latter
range of buidings projected beyond the former; and on
the north facade of this more easterly group, towards its
north-west corner, was the grand entrance staircase. Now
Theodore had ‘the interior portion, ze, the left of the

1Z. P. in vit. Conon, “Paschalis .... scribit Joanni novo
patricio et exarcho, promittens ei dationem si persona ejus ad
pontificatum eligatur; qui statim mandat... . suis judicibus, quos

Romze ordinavit, et direxit ad disponendam civitatem ut...
(archidiaconus) eligatur.”

*Partem exteriorem “ab oratorio S. Silvestri et basilica domus
Julize, quee super campum respicit, occupat” Paschalis. -Z. P.

ST. SERGIUS IL 79

grand staircase; Pascal, the right of the staircase, ze,
the site of the modern palace, embracing the oratory of
St. Silvester and the Julian basilica, and which abutted
on the nave of the great Lateran basilica,

To put an end to the deadlock produced by the obstinate ee of
refusal of both candidates to yield their pretensions, the
least factious, and consequently more numerous! and
sounder portion of the community, met together in the
palace of the emperors (ad sacrum palatium), and, after
much discussion, chose a third candidate in the person of
the priest Sergius. They first took him into an oratory
(that of St. Cesarius M.) in the imperial palace, and then
by force established him in the Lateran palace. The
archpriest Theodore at once submitted and did homage
to Sergius; and Pascal was made to do likewise.2 No
sooner, however, was Pascal left to himself than he spared
no promises of money to induce the exarch to come
quickly and secretly to Rome. Quite unexpectedly,
accordingly, Platyn arrived in Rome. So secretly did he
come, that the usual procession, with crosses and standards,
which went out of the city some distance to greet the
exarch on his coming to Rome, was only able in this
instance to get just outside the city by the time Platyn
was upon it. And though he did not feel himself strong
enough to set at naught the wishes of the people at large
in their choice of Sergius, he insisted that the 100 Ibs,
of gold (about £4200), promised him by Pascal, should
be paid by Sergius. It was to no purpose that Sergius
declared that he had given no such undertaking, and that
he had not the money to give. The exarch would have

his bond. As a guarantee that the sum should be
1 “Primates judicum, exercitus, cleri plurima pars, atquee civium
multitudo.” LZ. P.
2 “Theodorus... . se humiliavit . . . . (Sergium) salutavit ;
(Paschalis) coactus . . . . volens nolens S.” (salutavit), 24.

Miserable
end of
Pascal,
692.

Character

of Sergius,

80 ST. SERGIUS I.

ultimately paid, Sergius offered to pledge the ‘canthari’
(candelabra) and crowns which for ages had hung before
the altar and confession of St. Peter. In vain, Platyn would
have his pound of flesh, no more or no less. And not until
the money ! was actually raised and paid over would the ex-
arch permit Sergius to be consecrated (December 15, 687).

Not long after, for certain magical practices, Pascal was
deprived of his archdeaconate, and shut up in a monastery,
where he died impenitent in 692 or 693.

The priest thus picked out like a brand from the
burning to rule the Church of God was a Syrian of
Antioch. His father, Tiberius, had apparently emigrated
to Sicily, perhaps in consequence of the Mohammedan
incursions ; and Sergius was educated at Palermo. Coming
to Rome he was received into the ranks of the Roman
clergy by Pope Adeodatus. And, because he was zealous
and clever at music, he was handed over? for training
to the ‘head cantor’ (pvzor¢ cantorum), At that time he
must have reached man’s estate, as he became Pope
about sixteen years after his arrival from Sicily. And
though the ‘schola cantorum’ was at this period reserved
for youths in the mznor orders, it is supposed that the
phrase in the Book of the Popes just quoted means that
Sergius was attached to that school. He was at length
ordained priest (June 27, 683) by Leo II., for the ‘title’
(Church) of St. Susanna ‘ad duas domos’ on the Quirinal.
Whilst a priest he was distinguished by his love for saying
Mass in the catacombs.‘ For in this century pious interest

Neo, O24
» Ib, “Paschalis ab officio archidiaconatus pro aliquibus incanta-
tionibus .... privatus est; .... post quinquennium impenitens

defunctus est.”

* Jb, “Priori cantorum pro doctrina est traditus.” Cf ep. 41 Paul. I
(ed. Gundlach).

* This paragraph from the Z. P,

ST. SERGIUS I. 81

in these cemeteries of the early Christians seems to have
fallen off considerably.

Passing over his reception (688) of St. Julian’s second Sergius
apology on the orthodoxy of certain phrases used by the eee

fourteenth council of Toledo,! we will review in succession
his relations with this country. Some time in the latter ‘
half of 688, Czedwalla, ‘the strong-armed, the powerful
king of the West Saxons, “quitted his rule for the sake
of Our Lord and His everlasting kingdom,” and went, the
first of our royal pilgrims, to the successors of St. Peter,
to Rome to be baptised ‘in the church of the apostles.’
His conversion was one of the results of the indefatigable
exertions of St. Wilfrid. Arrived in Rome, he was bap-
tised by the Pope, taking, ‘at Father Sergius’ word,’ the
name of Peter (April 10, 689). And while ‘still in his
white garments,’ he fell ill and died (April 20); thereby
having had fulfilled for him his wish of immediately passing
to the joys of heaven in his baptismal innocence. We can
only imagine the interest and joy with which Sergius
looked on this barbarian prince, whom religion had changed
so rapidly from a revengeful warrior into a gentle and
tender follower of the crucified Lamb of God. The Pope
ordered the remains of the royal convert to be buried in
St. Peter’s, and an epitaph to be placed over his tomb, so
that men might be induced to be imitators of his virtue.

ER SUD Ds 5/7:

2 VY. Bede, H. E, v. 73 A.-Sax. Chron. ad an. 688; and De
Gest. Lang., vi. 15. From the concluding part of the epitaph, given
by Bede, it is clear that the date of Czedwalla’s death was 689, and not
688, as the 4.-Sax. Chron., and others who have followed it, would

make out. “Hic despositus est Ceadvalla ... . indictione secunda,
.... pontificante .... Sergio.... anno secundo.” A line or

two of the epitaph runs:

“ Caedual armipotens, liquit amore Dei,
Ut Petrum, sedemque Petri rex cerneret hospes . .. «
Barbaricam rabiem, nomen et inde suum
VOl lee Pia i.

(i) Ceed-
walla

685-688).

(ii) St.
Wilfrid
and Brith-
wald.

82 ST. SERGIUS f.

Sergius was one of the many popes who favoured St.
Wilfrid! in his long struggle against the ‘Celtic customs.’
And he supported him, not only by ordering that his
dignity should be restored to him, but by approving of
Brithwald as St. Theodore’s successor in the See of
Canterbury. For Brithwald showed himself a friend to
Wilfrid. In the new archbishop’s behalf the Pope
wrote two letters.2 The first was addressed to “ Ethelred,
Alfrid and Aldulf, kings of the Angles.” In it
Sergius bids them rejoice that the first of the apostles
and the most firm rock of the faith, Peter, is mindful of
them, and bids them gladly receive Bishop Brithwald, the
primate of all Britain, bestowed on them by his (St.
Peter’s) authority. In his letter to all the bishops of
Britain, Sergius rejoices in the good repute in which they
are, informs them that Brithwald has, on account of
his merits, obtained from him,? that is from Blessed
Peter, the prince: of “the apostles; the primacy of all
the churches of Britain, and exhorts them to receive

Conversus convertit ovans, Petrumque vocari
Sergius antistes jussit,” etc.

The epitaph is given best in Mai’s Classic. Auctor.,v. p. 404. Though
the first to accomplish this pilgrimage, Czdwalla was not the first
of our kings to form the intention of making it. We read in Bede
(47, E., iv. c. 4) that Oswy “bore so great affection to the Roman and
apostolical institution, that, had he recovered of his sickness, he had
designed to go to Rome, and there to end his days at the holy
places.” :

1 Sup., p. 26 f.

* Ap. Malmesb., De Gest. Pont., 1. i., ed. Migne, pp. 1467-8. “ Exsul-
tate quod . . . . egregius ac primus app. Petrus fidei firmissima petra,

Gi nominum quoque vestrorum reminiscitur.... Et vos, igitur,
ejus auctoritate collatum vobis antistitem Brithwaldum Cantiz sedis
preesulem totiusque Britinnize primum pontificem . . . . mente devota
suscipite.”

: Hence the Z. P. says simply : “ Hic ordinavit Berectualdum Brit-
anniz archiep.scopum ”; where by “ordinavit archiepiscopum” the
conferring of the primacy must be understood, as in the text,

ST. SERGIUS I. 83

and obey their new primate as they would the Pope
himself

Among the many Englishmen who went to Rome in (iii) Ceol.
the days of Pope Sergius were certain monks of the V Bode.
monasteries of SS. Peter and Paul of Wearmouth. They
had been sent by their abbot, the wise and energetic
Ceolfrid, to obtain a charter of privilege for his double
monastery, such as Benedict Biscop had obtained from Pope
Agatho2 Doubtless from these monks Sergius would
hear more particulars of the great learning of their fellow-
monk, Bede. At the mention of the name of this noble
Englishman, the glory of the Saxon Church, and the
most enlightened man in Europe in his day, which of
his countrymen does not feel a glow of just national
pride? And what English writer, when he has occasion
to mention his name, but feels a strong temptation to
leave his subject and dilate on the transcendent merits
of this simple northern monk? We must, however, resist
our inclinations and refer our readers for information
regarding him to any of the historians of England. For
whatever their religious belief, one and all have a good
word for Bede, the father of English History. The
enthusiasm which, after the lapse of so many centuries,
the name of Bede arouses in Englishmen to-day was
apparently felt by his contemporary Pope Sergius. At
any rate, William of Malmesbury has preserved for us a
letter,2 addressed by Pope Sergius (about the year 701)

1“ Brithwaldus ... . a nobis, imoa b. Petro App. principe primatum
omnium ecclesiarum Britannice sortitus, cum sacro usu pallii....
illic demandatus est .. . . Monemus ut eidem . . . . ac sinobis debitum

ministerii honorem exsolvere, et ut praesuli primatum gerenti efficaciter
sciatis obedire.” Cf Suf., Pt. I. 272, etc, regarding these two letters.
2 Bede, Vit. Adbbat., § 15.
3 Gesta. Reg. Angl., ed. Migne, P. L., t. 179, p. 1015. “Erit enim,
ut confidimus, etiam cunctis tibi creditis, profuturum quidquid Ecclesize
generali claruerit per ejus praestantiam impertitum.”

84 ST. SERGIUS I.

to abbot Ceolfrid, in which he asks him to send Bede to
Rome, so that he (Sergius) may consult with Bede. That
Bede, however, never went to Rome seems certain, as he
himself tells us! that he never left his monastery. But there
does not seem sufficient reason to doubt with some that
he was summoned there. Possibly the reason why Bede
remained at home was that the Pope who summoned him
died very soon after sending off the letter to Ceolfrid. In
his letter to the abbot, Sergius says that certain difficult
questions have arisen, and he is in need of learned men to
aid him in looking into them; and therefore he asks
Ceolfrid to send him without delay “that religious servant
of God, Bede (veligiosum Det famulum Bedam), a priest of
your monastery.” The Pope undertakes that Bede shall
return as soon as the business is finished for which he was
summoned, and points out that what Bede may do for
the Church will redound to the credit of the monastery.
Some have doubted of the authenticity of this letter,
because in a copy of it that is older than the work of
Malmesbury (viz., a Cotton MS., Tiberius A. xv.), the
name of Bede is not found,? but the letter N in its stead.
All, however, that that proves is that the one who tran-
scribed the letter (Tiberius A. xv.) could not clearly
make out the copy he had before him. And as Bede’s
name is found not only in Malmesbury, but in a MS,
copy of the whole letter, of which Malmesbury only
professes to give us extracts, we find the letter now
accepted by such an authority as Jaffé3 Hence if Bede
did not go to Rome, he was probably summoned there.

1 H. E., v.24. Barnes (St. Peter in Rome, p. 282), however, believes
St. Bede went to Rome.

” The passage runs: “Dei famulum N venerabilis tui monasterii.”
Cf. Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 248-50.

° Regest. Pont., 2138 (1642). Cf. notes 51 and 63 in Migne, as
cited above. Lingard, 4.-S. Church, ii. note K, for the opposite view.

ST. SERGIUS I. 85

From the number of distinguished Englishmen who Ue
went to Rome in his time, it may be argued that Sergius
must have been one of the many popes who have had
and displayed great love for this country. Among the
rest who visited Pope Sergius was the most popular
Englishman, not only of his own time, but of many
succeeding years, the abbot Aldhelm, afterwards Bishop
of Sherburne, and the practical founder of Malmesbury
Abbey. The present abbey church of Malmesbury,
which, partly in ruins and partly in use, does so much
to deepen the old-world aspect of that quaint old
Wiltshire town, well typifies, with its massive yet comely
Norman pillars, the strong, yet most attractive character
of the monk Aldhelm.t. Having obtained large grants
of land for his monastery from the kings of Mercia and
Wessex, he went, with their consent, to Rome to obtain
from Pope Sergius a charter of privilege for his beloved
abbey. William of Malmesbury tells? us with pride how
well Aldhelm was received by the Pope, who made the
abbot stay with him in the Lateran palace, and was
delighted to find in the Anglo-Saxon as well learning
as piety. Charmed with his virtue, Sergius made no
difficulty in granting Aldhelm (about 7or) a brief, plac-
ing his monasteries *® of Malmesbury and Frome under the
immediate jurisdiction of Rome.*

1 On Aldhelm, read Montalembert’s Monks of the West, v. 25f.;
Butler’s Lzves of the Saints, May 25.

2 De Gest. Pontif., \. v. p. 1637, ed. Migne. The whole of this book,
in four parts, is taken up with the life of Aldhelm. “Excitabat
venerantiam pontificis (Sergii) in abbatem, quod videretur a vite ejus
religione non discrepare scientiam, moribus non dissidere doctrinam.”

3 Malmesbury (20., p. 1639) quotes the whole document, that “those
who now think that it may be outraged with impunity may know to
what penalties they render themselves liable.”

4 “Prgesentibus apostolicis privilegiis praedicta monasteria decerni-
mus munienda ; quatenus sub jurisdictione atque tuitione ejusdem, cui et

86 ST. SERGIUS I

The love and respect for the See of Peter with which
our forefathers were animated, and which, despite the
difficulties and dangers of the way, urged them to Rome
in these centuries to visit the Popes, was, of course, of a
practical kind, of a kind which moved them to try to
bring others to the same way of thinking as themselves.
And so, wherever they came into contact with any want
of proper submission to the Holy See, they at once
endeavoured to subdue it. And while St. Wilfrid in the
North of England endeavoured to bring the Celts into
line with the Roman Church on the Easter question, St.
Aldhelm did the same in the South-West. Urged by a
West Saxon synod, Aldhelm wrote (705) to Geraint
(Geruntius), King of the Britons of Dyfnaint (Devonshire
and Cornwall), and to the priests of his kingdom, to
conform to the practices of the Roman Church in the
matter of the tonsure and Easter. After unfolding the
questions to them, he implored them “no longer con-
tumaciously to turn their backs on the doctrine and decrees
of Blessed Peter, and not, relying on the obstinacy of
might, arrogantly to despise the tradition of the Roman
Church on account of the ancient decrees of their fore-
fathers. For Peter, when, with happy voice, he had con-
fessed the Son of God, deserved to hear: ‘Thou art
Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, ete. ;
and to thee will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven’
(St. Matt. xvi. 18). If then the keys of the kingdom of
heaven were given by Christ to Peter . . . . who that sets
at naught the principal decrees of his Church will enter
the gates of heaven....? But perchance some wily
(strophosus) book-worm or smart analyst of the Scriptures
may offer some such defence as this: ‘With all the

nos deservimus, auctoris nostri b. Petri, et ejus, quam dispensamus,
Ecclesize et nunc sint et in perpetuum permaneant” (20., 1640).

ST. SERGIUS I. 87

sincerity of a believing heart do I venerate the doctrines
of both the Old and New Testament (utriusque instrument?).
I confess the Trinity, the Incarnation, etc... .. and by
virtue of this faith I shall be accounted a Catholic’... .
“Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well.
The devils also believe and tremble. ... Faith without
works is dead’ (St. James ii. 19). For Catholic faith and
the harmony of fraternal charity go hand in hand. And
to sum up all in one conclusion, to no purpose do they
boast of their possession of the Catholic faith, who do not
follow the doctrine and teaching. of St. Peter For the
foundation of the Church and the support of the faith,
resting in the first instance (principaliter) on Christ, and
then (seguenter) on Peter, will never be shaken by
tempests. As the apostle notes: ‘For other foundation
no man can lay, but that which is laid which is Jesus Christ’
(1 Cor. iii. 11). And to Peter has truth itself thus assigned
his position in the Church: ‘Thou art Peter, and upon
this rock I will build my Church.”

This letter caused many to conform to the Catholic Be ee
celebration of Easter, says Bede (7. Z., v. 18). sext OF

But it is time to retrace our steps and treat of matters areal 692,
that concern the Universal Church. The first of these
affairs of general interest that calls for our attention is
the so-called ‘Quinisext’ Council of 692, well described ?
by our first historian Bede as ‘erratic.’ The ‘cruel and
presumptuous’® Justinian II, in the year 692, reflecting

1 “Frustra de fide catholica inaniter gloriatur, qui dogma et regulam
S. Petri non sectatur.”” Ep. ap. Haddan and Stubbs, iii. p. 273; or
M. G. H.. Epp,, iti. p. 235.

2 De sex etat., ad an. 698.

3 Finlay’s estimate of him. /77st. of Greece, i. p. 386.

4 On the date, etc., of this council, cf Héfélé, v. p. 221, etc., Eng.
trans. By the Greeks the acts of this synod are spoken of as the acts

of the Sixth General Council. Cf the address of the bishops of the
Quinisext Council to the emperor.

88 ST. SERGIUS 1.

that the fifth and sixth cecumenical councils had issued
indeed important dogmatic decrees, but had not published
any disciplinary canons, summoned a synod to supply
this omission. As a sort of complement to the fifth and
sixth councils, this synod received the extraordinary
name of ‘Quinisext’; though it is sometimes called the
Trullan synod, because it was held in the same ‘domed’
hall as the Sixth General Council. From the extant
subscriptions to its canons, it appears that some 211
Eastern bishops took part in this council, so fraught with
important results both in the history of the Church and in
that of Europe. By legalising a married clergy the fathers
of this council so far at least degraded the whole body of
the Eastern clergy as to render it, by that very concession,
less powerful for good ; and, drawing such a sharp line
of demarcation between Eastern and Western custom on
such an important practical question, made a still further
step in the direction of the separation of the Eastern and
Western Churches—a separation fatal to Christianity in
the East. The attempt on the part of this synod to place
the See of Constantinople on a level in ecclesiastical
matters with that of Rome was of course another advance
towards schism. And anything that tended to produce
isolation of the Eastern Church meant isolation and de-
struction for the Greek empire. The council ‘in Trullo,
remarks Finlay," was “an additional cause ot separation,
when the strictest unity of religious opinions was necessary
to maintain the political power of the empire.”

Of the 102 canons decreed by the Quinisext Council,
some consist simply of the renewal of ancient canons;
some, again, were liturgical ; while others treated of monks
and nuns, fasting and superstitions. Many of the decrees
were made in direct opposition to the custom of the Roman

1 Hist. of Greece, i. p. 386.

ST, !SERGIUS 71. 89

Church. Among others, one of the canons on clerical
celibacy (the thirteenth), after setting forth the opposite
discipline of the Roman Church, adds: “We, however, allow
them (priests and deacons) to continue in matrimony,” and
forbid them to send away the wives they had before their
promotion to Sacred Orders——Thus did these infatuated
Greeks cast away the salt that preserves the Church, a
celibate clergy. By their thirty-sixth canon also, the
Orientals aimed a blow at the See of Rome that only
recoiled on themselves, and left them more than ever the
slaves of the emperors of Constantinople. ‘“ We define,”
runs the canon,! “that the See of Constantinople shall enjoy
equal rights with that of Old Rome, shall be exalted in
ecclesiastical affairs as it is, and shall be second after it.”
It may be noted in passing what a striking acknowledg-
ment that canon was of the pre-eminent position in the
Church of the Roman Pontiff at that time. While
endeavouring to snatch the crown, it showed on whose
head it was.

These canons were signed by the emperor, and by all
the great patriarchs but the Roman, whose place, im-
mediately after the emperor’s, was left unfilled. If Arch-
bishop Basil of Gortyna, in Crete, signed the decrees,
adding, after his name, “ holding the place of the whole
synod of the Holy Church of Rome,” just as he did at the
Sixth General Council, it was not that he had received any
special commission from Rome to represent it at the council,
but that he acted on his own responsibility. And when

1 Can. 36. dplComer bore rdv KovoravtivourdAews Opdvov tay towy
amoravew mpeoBelwy ToD THs mpeaBurepas Pduns Opdvov, kad év Tots éxkAnot-
aortikots @s exeivov peyadiverOar mpdyuact, devrepoy wer’ exeivoy dmdpxovra.
As the Liber Synodicus (quoted by Pitzipios, L’église Orientale, p.
12) states, the patriarchs of Constantinople wished to be as powerful
in the Church as in the State! mavtolws peyaduverOat, Soweo ev Tots
moaitiKols, o'Tw Kal ev Tots eKKANTLATTIKOLS MpayWaoW,

“90 ST. SERGIUS I.

the Book of the Popes, in its life of Sergius, says* that the
‘legates’ of the Pope subscribed, deceived by the emperor,
it means the papal apocristari resident at Constantinople.
For it is quite certain that no legates were despatched by
the Pope to represent him at the council. And when
Nicholas I., in a letter to the Emperor Michael (ep. 86, an.
865), speaks of the emperor’s predecessors, in the time of
Pope Conon, leading into error those who wanted to save
them, Héfélé believes he refers to these very afpocriszarit,
who had at least been sent to Constantinople by Conon.
Justinian, however, knowing well that without the
signature of the Roman Pontiff the decrees of his council
would have no force in the West at any rate, straightway
sent them to Rome, and required the Pope, as ‘the head of
all the bishops, to sign them. But though many of the
decrees were excellent, it was not to be expected that the
Pope would sign them as a whole. And indeed he boldly
declared 2 that he would die rather than put his signature to
them; and he would not allow them to be read. As usual
with the rulers of Constantinople, Justinian at once had
recourse to violence. “And well was it for the Roman
See,” says a non-Catholic writer, “that a strong man filled
the chair of St. Peter.” Finding that carrying off two of
the Pope’s councillors to Constantinople had no effect in
daunting Sergius, the emperor sent Zacarias, his proto-

1 “Tn quo (concilio) et Legati Sedis Apostolicze convenerant, et
decepti subscripserant.” Z. P.

2 “ Compellabatur et ipse (papa) subscribere, sed nullatenus acquievit.
Pro eo quod guedam capitula extra ritum ecclesiasticum fuerant in eo
annexa. Quz synodaliter definita ....in hanc urbem ad confir-
mandum, vel in superiori loco subscribendum Sergio Pontifici, utpote
capiti omnium sacerdotum (imperator) direxit. . . . Eos (tomos synodi)
ut invalidos respuit . . . . eligens ante mori quam novitatum erroribus
consentire.” LZ. P. Cf. Bede, De sex eiat., ad an. 698; Paul. Diac.,
De Gest. Langob., vi. 11.

° Hodgkin, /taly and her Invaders, Vi. p. 354.

ST. SERGIUS L op

spatharius, or captain of the bodyguard, to Rome with
orders to drag the Pope himself to Constantinople.

But “a change had come over the spirit of the dream”
since the days of Pope Martin. Mingled with the scant
residue of the Italian citizens of the Roman empire, the
barbarians, who broke that empire to pieces, and had
settled down in Italy, its fairest province, were begin-
ning to form a new and vigorous Italian people. Italy,
or those parts of it in which they dwelt, was now be-
ginning to be regarded by them as their country. They
were organising themselves! for its defence. They were
beginning to see that it was not the emperor of Con-
stantinople that had their interests at heart; they could
see that their money was all he cared for. On the other
hand, it was equally plain? to them that the only one
of any position who had any care for their concerns,
and who was any manner of protection to them against
the tyrannical Greek official or the Lombard, was the
Bishop of Rome. Around him, then, would they rally!
No longer would they allow him to be carried off with
insult to Constantinople. Accordingly, no sooner did the
errand of Zacarias become known, than the “army of

Ravenna and of the Duchy of Pentapolis”® marched to Zacarias

in Rome

Rome. In terror Zacarias begged the Pope to have the to carry

gates of the city shut; and with tears besought him

off the

Pope, 693

not to allow anyone to lay hands on him. But soon the % °%*

troops of Ravenna were thundering at the gates of the

1 Cf suf. on what has been said of the ‘army’ of Rome (exercitus
Romane militiz. Z. P. in vit. Serg.) of this period. What is to be said
presently, “ Ravennatis militiae,” etc., shows that local forces—in opposi-
tion to Byzantine troops—were already in active service at Ravenna, etc.

2 This is the thought of Gregorovius, Rome in the Middle Ages, ii. pp.
181-3, Eng. trans.

3 First mention of this duchy, which included the districts around
the five maritime cities of Ancona, Sinigaglia, Fano, Pesaro, and
Rimini.

St. Willi-
brord and
Frisia,

92 ST. SERGIUS L.

Lateran palace. The guardsman took refuge under the
Pope’s bed, and Sergius showed himself to the soldiers.
The people were somewhat appeased when they found
that, contrary to the report, the Pope had not been
carried off during the night and placed on board ship
for Constantinople. Calmed by the Pope’s word, they
spared the guardsman’s life, but drove him in ignominy
from the city. “And,” adds the papal biographer, “ by the
action of Divine justice, he who sent the guardsman was
at this time deprived of hig kingdom.” The reference is
to the uprising of Leontius (695), who, by a successful
coup de main, seized the imperial throne, and sent off
the cruel Justinian with his nose slit as an exile to
Cherson.2, Thus did one more angry wave beat but to
break itself into impotent spray and foam against the
rock of Peter.

The country lying between the Rhine and the Elbe, and
bounded on the north by the ocean, and which, at this
period, bore the name of Frisia, had received already the
first seeds of Christianity from St. Eligius and our own St.
Wilfrid. But it was reserved for another Anglo-Saxon,
sent by Pope Sergius, to complete the conversion of Frisia.
Willibrord, one of that large number of devoted English
and Irish saints that won to the faith of Christ the whole
of Central Europe, arrived in Frisia about the year 691;
and when Eddi was writing his life of Wilfrid, was, as that
biographer noted (c. 26), still continuing the work of his
master (Wilfrid) in converting the people of Friesland.
Trained in St. Wilfrid’s monastery of Ripon, and in Ireland,
Willibrord conceived a great desire to labour in a vineyard,

1 All these details in the Z. P. Sergius “suavi responso, eorum corda
linivit, quamquam illi zelo ducti pro amore et reverentia tam Ecclesize
Dei, quamque sanctissimi Pontificis . . . . denominatum spatarium cum
injuriis et contumeliis a civitate depulerunt.”

2 Theoph. in Chron., ad an. 687 ; Bede, De sex e¢at., ad an. 698.

ST. SERGIUS If. 93

wherein some of his fellow-monks had gone to toil, but
had gleaned but little fruit. As soon as Willibrord landed,
he found that the prospects of preaching the faith with
success were greater than before, owing to the fact that
Pippin of Heristal had made Radbod, duke of the Frisians,
acknowledge the suzerainty of the Franks. Accordingly
“he made haste? to get to Rome, that he might begin his
wished-for labour of preaching the Gospel to the heathens,
with the leave and blessing of Pope Sergius, who was then
Pope.” He also, adds Bede, wanted thence to learn or
procure various things which so great a work required.
Great success attended the labours of Willibrord and his
fellow-workers. With the consent of all, Willibrord was
sent to Rome by Pippin, with the request that he might
be made archbishop of the Frisians. Very willingly did
Sergius consent, and Willibrord was consecrated (November
21, 695) in St. Cecilia’s. The Pope on that occasion
changed his name to Clement, and sent him back to his
bishopric fourteen days after his arrival in Rome? A
most interesting document has preserved for us the true
date of the consecration of Willibrord. It is ordinarily
stated, on the authority of Ven. Bede, that he was con-
secrated November 22, 696, which was a Wednesday.
1 “ \cceleravit (Willibrordus) venire Romam, . . . . ut cum ejus
(Sergii) licentia et benedictione, desideratum evangelizandi gentibus
opus iniret” (Bede, H. £., v. c. 11). The great St. Boniface, who
himself laboured in Frisia, and was finally martyred there (755), says :
“Tempore Sergii.... venit ad limina SS. App. presbyter... .
nomine Willibrord .... quem prefatus Papa episcopum ordinavit,
et ad preedicandam paganam gentem Fresonum, transmisit in littoribus

Oceani occidui.” (Ep. ad Pap. Stephanum, No. 109, ed. Diimmler
M. G. H. Epp., iii.)

2 Bede, 22. “Misit Pippinus .... Willibrordum Romam, . ;
postulans ut eidem Fresonum genti archiepiscopus ordinaretur,” etc.
(Cf. Bede, De sex etat.,ad an. 698; LZ. P.). On St. Willibrord, see
Butlers Lives of the Saints, for Nov. 7, and the authorities there

quoted,

04. ST. SERGIUS I.

But in the National Library at Paris there is preserved a
MS. Calendar (Lat. 10837) (a part of which has been
published in facs¢mzle), which was used by St. Willibrord
himself. In the margin of this calendar he has written
that he came from across the seas into France in the year
690; that, though unworthy, he was ordained bishop by
the Apostolic Pope Sergius in 695; and that ‘now,’ in the
year 698, he was still at work. The day, indeed, of his
consecration is not marked by the saint himself, but an
apparently contemporary hand has added, in the margin of
the calendar, to the 21st November the words, “ The con-
secration of our lord Clement.” The 21st November, a
Sunday, is then clearly the true date. All this is told us
by Duchesne in his notes to the biography of Sergius in
his edition of the Lzber Pontzficaltzs.

By the time of his death (739) the Frisians, as a nation,
had become Christian. It is surely scarcely necessary to
call attention to the fact that the history of the missionary
work of the apostle of the Frisians is another proof that
in the West the Gospel was only preached by those
‘who were sent, that is, ‘received their mission,’ from the
successors of St. Peter.

Theschism Mention has already! been made of the success of

of Aquileia

ae ‘A 1 In the Life of St. Gregory LCf L. P. in vit.; Paulus, De Gest.

698. Langob., vi. 14; Bede, De sex efat., ad an. 708, who writes: “A
synod convened at Aquileia had not confidence, by reason of its
ignorance of the true faith, to act upon the resolutions of the Fifth
General Council. But at length, instructed by the salutary admonitions
of the Blessed Pope Sergius, it, in conjunction with the rest of the
Churches of Christ, assented to its decrees.” Cf the rude contemporary
poem quoted in Waitz’s ed. of Paulus Diac., MZ. G. SS. Langob., p.
190, One of its stanzas runs thus :

Utreque parti rex pius elegere
Cunincperct jubet legatos diregere
sedem ad sanctam, ubi Christo presole
data potestas nectere et solvere
Petro piscanti ceeli archeclavio.

ST. SERGIUS I. ob

Pope Sergius in extinguishing the schism of Aquileia.
Comparing the accounts of this affair that have been
left us by the Lzber Pontificalis, by Bede and Paul the
Deacon, with the contemporary poem edited by Bethmann,
it would appear either that a synod was first held at
Aquileia, in which the schism was reaffirmed, and that
then afterwards, by the efforts of Pope Sergius and
King Cunincpert, who summoned a synod at Pavia
about 700, the schism was quashed for ever at that
council. Or else, which seems more likely, that what
Bede and the others call the ‘synod of Aquileia,” simply
meant, as it often did in the language of those times,
the collection of suffragan bishops under the patriarch
of Aquileia. Hence we may conclude that the king of
the Lombards, acting in unison with the Pope, invited
the bishops of the schismatical patriarchate to a synod
at Pavia. They came, and amidst tears of joy on their
own part and those of the spectators, they declared
their wish to be restored to the unity of the Church.
The joyful news was sent to Sergius, who blessed the
king with the words, that he who converteth a sinner
from the error of his ways shall save his soul from
death, and shall cover a multitude of sins (St. James v.
20). At the same time he ordered that all the works
treating on the errors of the late schismatics should be
burnt, lest the new converts might be again troubled
with the same evil doctrines.

The name of Sergius is also connected with another ee
famous city in the north-east of Italy, with Venice, or, eS
to speak more accurately, with the Venetians, who at about 700,
this time inhabited the various islands, on some of
which Venice was founded later on (about 710). Driven,
willingly or unwillingly, from the mainland by Huns,
Goths and Lombards, the inhabitants of the old province

96 _ $f. SERGIUS I,

of Venetia took refuge on the numerous islands that lie
in the midst of the muddy shallows or lagunes situated
between the rivers Adige and Piave. There, protected
by! the shallows from the mainland and from the sea
by the intricate channels between the outermost encircling
islets, the Venetians maintained a practical, if not always
nominal, independence from the days of the Goths until
the days of that arch-destroyer Napoleon, called the
Great.

Up to the period now being treated of, the different
isles and cities of which the rising republic was formed
were more or less independent of one another, each under
its own ‘tribune.’ The result of this system of govern-
ment was, of course, weakness both at home and abroad.
Accordingly, about the year 700, there assembled in
the city of Heraclea, Cristoforo, patriarch of Grado, his
suffragans, the clergy, the tribunes, the nobles and the
people. The outcome of their deliberations was the
election of a duke or ‘doge, with authority over all
the ‘lagune state.” The first doge of Venice was
Paoluccio Anafesto. It is also said by Hazlitt? that
the promoters of this new constitution asked and
obtained from Pope Sergius his confirmation of their
action. On this Hazlitt remarks: “In a newly-formed
society like that of Venice, placed in the difficult situa-
tion in which the republic found herself at the close
of the seventh century .... it ought to create no
surprise that the patriarch Christoforo and his supporters
should have formed a unanimous determination to pro-
cure the adhesion and consent of the Holy See before
any definite steps were taken to carry the resolutions
of the popular assembly into effect. The mission,

1 Cf. Hodgkin, Jtaly and her Invaders, vi. 484 f.
2 History of the Venetian Republic, vol. i. c. ii.

ST. SERGIUS I. 97

which was immediately despatched for this purpose to
Aquileia, where the Pope was then holding a council,
consisted of Michele Participazio (or Badoer) and two
other Venetian citizens of good family. The result was
eminently favourable.”? As, however, the beginnings of
all great states are always more or less obscure, and as
the principal authority for this account of the foundation
of the Venetian republic is apparently the Chronicle ° of the
Doge, Andrea Dandolo, which, though a great work, was
not written till the close of the first half of the fourteenth
century, we must conclude that the origin of the Venetian
Republic is not known with any great degree of certainty.
While thus occupied with such great external works as
the conversion of nations, the extinction of schisms, and
the foundation of states, Sergius did not neglect affairs at
home of lesser moment. St. Peter’s, St. Paul’s, and other
basilicas he repaired and adorned, and furnished with new
and splendid vessels of marble, gold, and silver. He also
richly endowed and adorned the church of St. Susanna on
the Quirinal, of which he had been parish priest, and which
was in a very struggling condition, as both ‘ Anastasius’
and a marble inscription pieced together by De Rossi,
recording the deed of gift to the Priest John, inform? us.

1 From what has just been said above, this is rather a misleading
phrase. The Pope was not present in person, as far as we know, at
this council of Aquileia, or rather of Pavia.

2 Cf, Hodgkin and Hazlitt, #67 sup.,and Muratori, Aznal,, ad an. 697.

3 Ap. Muratori, R. 7. S., xii. ole Oey a

5 De Rossi, Bull. d. Arch. crist., 1870, p. 89 seg., cited by Duchesne,
L. P., i. 379-80, where this important document is given in full. The
inscription, which runs to some sixty lines, begins as follows.
The words in brackets show the restorations of De Rossi.
“Dilectissimo Filio Johanni PB (tituli scz vir)ginis et martyris XPI

Susan sf
Neeet per eumeidem vene(rabili eccla) Sergius Episc. Servus sevorum Di
Dum apostolicis pontific(ibus divinze p)rovidentize suze dignatione Dns

WOES JG iw DUE

Sergius
adorns
and
repairs
various
basilicas,

Sergius
adds the
‘ Agnus
Dei’ to
the Mass.

98 ST. SERGIUS I.

He also discovered in an out-of-the-way corner of the
sacristy of St. Peter’s a silver box, which proved to
contain a portion of the true cross enclosed in a beautifully
jewelled cross,! which relic, say the historians? of this
discovery, has ever since that time been ‘kissed and
adored’ by all the people on the feast of the ‘Exaltation
of the Holy Cross’ in the basilica of Our Saviour (the
Lateran). While searching about in the sacristy, Sergius
also came across the body of St. Leo the Great. This he
transferred (June 28, 688) to a splendid tomb which he
caused to be erected in a prominent position (pudlico loco)
in the interior of the basilica itself, as again we have on the
authority not only of the Look of the Popes but of the
inscription still preserved,® set up by Sergius on the
occasion.

In connection with the service of the Church, he ordained
that “at the time of the breaking of Our Lord’s body (in
the Mass) the ‘Agnus Dei’ should be sung by clergy
and people.”* He also decreed that on the feasts of
Noster Ihs XPS eccles. su(ze regimen e)t ecclesiasticarum rerum dispen
Sationem commiserit pr(o data potest)ate qui vicem apostolorum prin
Cipis gerit libratione per(pendat opus) est ut pereequari debeant ec
Clesiarum subjacentium Q(uzestus et indi)gentiam sustinenti succurri

Quatenus non altera lau(toreditu gaudeat altera angustiis prematur inopi)
ENG.

Farms are assigned to the Church from the Sabine, Tuscan, City
(Urban) and other patrimonies. The inscription terminates with the
usual denunciation against any who shall presume to alienate any of
the Pope’s gifts.

1 Probably very like the famous cross of Justin IL., still preserved at
St. Peter’s, writes Duchesne, i. 378.

47. P.,and Bede, De sex @tat., ad an. 701. “ Quee (crux) ex die
illo . .. . abomni populo Christiano . . . . osculatur ac adoratur.”

3 De Rossi, /uscripf. Christ., t. ii.; Duchesne, Z. P., i. 379.

Two of the lines run:

“Sergius antistes, divino impulsus amore,
Nunc in fronte sacre transtulit inde domus.”

‘LP. Cf Pagi, Brev. Gest., n. 23 in vit., who discusses the introduc-

ST. SERGIUS L 99

the ‘Annunciation, the ‘Nativity, the ‘Dormition’ or
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, and of ‘St. Simeon’
(or the Purification),! litanies should be recited from the
Church of St. Adrian to St, Mary.

This great and holy Pope was buried in St. Peter’s Death of
(September 8, 701). The epitaph which Baronius gives as 7G
belonging to this Pope really belongs to Sergius III. But
we may cite as his epitaph what Alcuin? says of him in
his metrical life of St. Willibrord :

“Pontificalis apex, Petri dignissimus heres,
Sanctus apostolicam tenuit tunc Sergius aulam
Vir bonus et prudens, xuli pietate secundus.”
We have now set forth the history of the popes for a Review of

5 S " : work done
hundred years ; and, considering the number of biographies up to this

that have had to be written, it must be confessed that not P gis
very much has been said about them. The reason of that,
however, is, that there is very little to be said. Of all the
centuries of the Middle Ages, we know least about this their

first century, at any rate as far as the popes are concerned,

with the possible exception of the tenth century. In the

dearth of historical records,? practically all that is to be

told of the popes of the seventh century has now been told.

From what the genuine records of history have made The popes

known to us, we see that during this seventh century the See aoe

: 5 century
of Rome was occupied by an unbroken succession of good ail good
men.

tion of the ‘Dona Nobis pacem,’ instead of the ‘miserere nobis,’ the
third time that the ‘Agnus Dei’ is said.

1 “Quod Greci ‘hypapantem’ appellant.” Z. P.

2 Monument. Alc., p. 66,c. 4; ¢f. Acta SS. Boll., oth September
(iii. 425-445), the day on which he is commemorated in the Roman
Martyrology. .

3 Hearken to the lament of Muratori (Amma/., ad an. 698): “ Né vo’
lasciar di accenare quanto fosse in questi tempi infelice la condizion
delle lettere in Italia, perché mancante di scuole e di maestri. . . . Per
cagione di tanta ignoranza rarissimi erano allora coloro che scrivessero
libri, e per gran tempo niuno ci fu che registrasse gli avvenimenti e la
storia del suo secolo.”

Work
done by
the popes
in the
seventh

century.

100 ST. SERGIUS I.

men. It opened and closed with the fourteen years’ reign of
asaint. So bright are their characters, that it would be to
degrade them to contrast them with, we will not say,
the secular princes of their time, but even with their
would-be rivals, the ambitious patriarchs of Constantinople.
There are, indeed, a number of modern historians who, to
serve their ends or to indulge a habit, have supplied from
their imaginations the lacune of contemporary authorities.
With material thus derived, they have endeavoured to
detract from, or to dull the bright characters of some of
the popes of this seventh century, by attributing more
or less disreputable ‘ motives’ to their actions. We have
tried to steer clear of such an unscientific and unsatisfactory
course, and to let the plain facts of history speak for them-
selves. And again we assert that these facts tell us that
if Honorius I. was a little weak in theological acumen,
the aged Conon somewhat wanting, on one occasion, in
economical foresight, the popes of the seventh century
were model men, and a credit to the high position they
occupied.

Abroad we have seen the popes materially assisting in
the conversion of nations to the faith of Christ, in the
foundation of states, in extinguishing schisms, and com-
batting heresies backed by imperial power; and, by their
influence over the barbaric kings of the Lombards, saving
Rome for the empire and for its citizens. And though
we have seen the Holy See kept vacant for months, the
palace of the popes plundered, themselves assailed with
violence and sent off to exile and to death, in what
condition do we find them at the close of the century?
Stronger than they were at the beginning. The schism
that weakened their power in Italy has been closed, and
they have become so strong in the affections of the people
that the despotic power of the Eastern emperors has

ST. SERGIUS I. IOI

broken against them. By the end of this century the
popes have become safe from Oriental tyranny, and, we
may add, their temporal power is assured. For in the
next century we shall see that temporal power an accom-
plished fact, and Italy freed, by the action of the popes,
from the incubus of the Lombards, as it was practically
freed in this century from the Eastern emperors.
In this century, then, it is asserted that the foundations of Comple-

tion of the

the temporal power of the popes were strengthened to the omnes
10NS

point of being ready to receive the superstructure. While of the
we find Gibbon, Milman, and Greenwood, in their calmer een
moments, asserting that it ‘was the circumstances of the
times’ that forced temporal power into the hands of the
popes, we find many at all times roundly proclaiming that
it was by their own ambitious exertions that such power
ever fell into their hands. Their proof of their proposition
would seem to be that the popes did acquire temporal
power, and ¢herefore it must have been the result of their
ambition. As historical data are wanting to them, they
fall back upon J/ogic. The records of the history of the
popes of the seventh century show, however, that the
popes owed their temporal power to the manner in which
they attached to themselves the people of Italy, by the
unexceptionable arts of defending their civil liberties
against emperor and Lombard, of expending the wealth
of the Holy See on the poor and the captive, and of
upholding even to death the rights of conscience.

May it be ours now to write the history of the popes
of the eighth century, and to unfold the causes which
developed the temporal power of the popes, such as we

1 Speaking of the court of Constantinople, he says (Cathedra Petri,
Bk. iii. p. 195), “a nominal allegiance was all that could be claimed
(from Rome) or yielded, while the real powers of government jell by a
natura. necessity into the hands ot the chief (Gregory I.), who possessed
the public confidence,”

Papal
officials
of the
seventh
century.

102 ST. SERGIUS I.

have seen it in the hands of St. Gregory I., Honorius L.,
etc., into full and perfect independent regal sovereignty.

Before, however, entering upon the biographies of the
eighth century pontiffs, it may be convenient to bring
together the brief scattered notices that are to be met
with—chiefly in the letters of St. Gregory I. and the
Ordo Romanus I.—concerning the officials through whom
the pope governed his local See of Rome in the seventh
century.

For purposes of spiritual administration the city was
divided into parishes, in each of which was a ¢itular
church, presided over by a cardinal priest. At their head
was the important archpriest.

For the temporal needs of the people, and for other
purposes generally, the city had at a very early period
been divided into seven regions, partly, perhaps, because
the fourteen civil regions of the city could be easily
divided into seven fresh divisions; partly, perhaps, for
some mystical reason ; and again, perhaps, that there might
be a fixed set of officials each day to attend the pope at
the various s¢adzons. It is certain that in the first ages of
the Church, seven notaries had been appointed to take
down the acts of the martyrs. When the centuries of per-
secution passed away, the notaries remained now in charge
of the Papal Chancery, and at their head in the seventh
century was one of the most distinguished members of the
officials of the pope, viz., the primicerius+ of the notaries.

In connection with the seven regions were seven
deaconries, bureaux as it were, where all that concerned
the poor? (hospitals, orphanages, etc.), was managed. At

1 First mentioned in the Z. P. under Julius I. (337-352).
* Diaconia “pro sustentatione et alimoniis fratrum nostrorum
Christi pauperibus” (Zzber D., f. 95) ; St. Gregory (xi. 17, al. 27) chose

aman “mensis pauperum et exhibendz diaconize elegimus preepon-
endum,”

ST. SERGIUS I. 103

the head of these establishments, as their name implies,
was a deacon. And over the deacons themselves was
a great functionary, the archdeacon, who is spoken of
in the Ordo Romanus as the Vicar of the Pope. Of
all the Roman officials of the seventh century, the
regionary deacons were the most important. From them
were selected the apocrisiarii who were sent to Con-
stantinople, and from their ranks were chosen the
successors of St. Peter. Their orders were carried out
by the regionary subdeacons and acolytes,

By all these functionaries was the pope assisted at the
Stations; and, during the vacancy of the Holy See or
during the absence of the pope, the Roman See was
governed by the archpriest, the archdeacon and the
primicerius of the notaries.

We have already seen how, equally in connection with
the seven regions, Gregory the Great established a college
of defensors, with a primicerius at their head, for the
management of the patrimonies of the Church in Rome
and elsewhere—the patrimonies whence were drawn the
means by which the work and charities undertaken by
the Roman Church were able to be carried on. The
dispensator ecclesie seems to have been the head per-
manent official connected with the administration of the
patrimonies.

In the documents of the seventh century there is also
frequent mention of the schola cantorum, again subject
to a primicerius. It was there, apparently, that the young
aspirants for the ranks of the Roman clergy received their
general as well as their musical education. They are
said to have left it when they had received the minor
order of acolyte.

Many other officers of the Roman Church are also not
unfrequently mentioned in our sources. There was the

104 ST. SERGIUS L.

Vicedominus, whom some would distinguish from the
Major-domo, assigning to the first! the charge of the papal
palace, and to the second the functions of a guest-master.
The xomenclator® was a sort of gentleman-usher; the
arcarius, the treasurer, chief of the papal exchequer ; and
the saccellarius, the paymaster, though Ewald® rather
regards him as an almoner.

Among the lay assistants of the pontifical administration
of high standing was the conszliarius (possibly legal
adviser*) of the Holy See. This official, several times
met with in the letters of Gregory the Great, is first
noticed by Pope Vigilius. Of the minor laymen in the
service of the Church were the mansionaritz, who had
to look after the churches, much as the modern sacristans
do. It only remains to be stated that as time went on
we shall find the sphere of action of some of these
officials diminished and that of others extended. Tem-
poral power, too, will bring with it new officers.

The centre of papal government during the seventh
century was the Lateran palace, whither in the course of
that period the documents relating to the Church were
removed from the library of Pope Damasus.® For a short
time during the next century a palace at the foot of the
Palatine Hill was to be the centre of papal activity.

* Greg. I., Ep. xi. 21 (33). Vicedominus has “curam episcopii” ; and

the Major-domo (Ep. xi. 54, al 72), “hospitalitatem et susceptiones
exhibere.”

2 Miley, Hist. of Papal States, i. 450.

3 Epp. Greg., ed. Ewald, i. p. 328 n.

* Ewald, note to Greg. Ep., iii. 18, says he knows not what was the
office or what the rank of the consiliartus among the officials of the
Apostolic See. He must certainly be regarded as a layman of great
dignity, as he is spoken of by Gregory as vir magnificus.

° Cf. Lanciani, Ancient Rome, pp. 189, 203,

OPIN VT:
A.D. 701-705.
J

Sources.—Short life in the Z. P. Eddius’ Life of St. Wilfrid
gives John’s connection with that saint and England. Cf
Redeye Le, VeetO:

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCHS OF >
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Tiberius ITI. Aripert IT., John Platyn, 687-702.
(Apsimar), 698-705. 700-712. Theophylact, 702-709.

AFTER a vacancy of one month and _ twenty-three
days, John, a Greek, was consecrated Bishop of Rome
(October 30, 701).

Probably sometime during the year 702 there came from The exarch
Sicily to Rome the new exarch Theophylact, Chamberlain waynes
and Patrician. Why he came to Rome we do not know. pe
Many modern authors are prepared to tell us. But the
cause assigned is of their own making, and consequently
in accordance with their prejudices. Theophylact may
have been simply passing through on his way to Ravenna.
However, whatever may have been his reason in coming
to Rome, supposing he had any particular reason at all,
his advent was viewed with suspicion by the friends of the

Pope, that is by all Italy, by all at least not subject to the

The Lom-
bards again
begin to
give
trouble to
the Duchy
of Rome,

702 (?).

106 JOHN VI.

Lombards. Accordingly, on hearing of the exarch's visit
the troops of the whole of Italy! marched tumultuously
to Rome, encamped outside the city, and made their ill-will
to the exarch particularly evident. The Pope, alarmed for
Theophylact’s safety, ordered the city gates to be shut, sent
priests to the camp, and through their exertions quelled the
sedition. Though the rioters spared the exarch, they
took vengeance on some of his would-be creatures, and
inflicted? grievous punishment on certain informers who
had taken advantage of the exarch’s presence to impeach
certain worthy citizens, that they might have an oppor-
tunity of fingering wealth that was not their own. Amid
the obscurity that surrounds this incident, one thing stands
out clear, and it is the loyalty of the popes to the rule of
the emperors, a loyalty that one act of tyranny after
another against themselves has not shaken, at least in
them. But the action of the local militia towards the
‘Life Guard’ officer Zacharias and towards the exarch
Theophylact shows that submission on the part of their
Italian subjects to the Eastern emperors’ rule—a rule
impotent and tyrannical at least in Italy—was rapidly
becoming a thing of the past. This eighth century will see
the end of it over by far the greater part of the territory
that in the preceding century rendered a more or less full
obedience to the exarch of Ravenna.

For some cause or other, the Lombards begin again
during this pontificate to give trouble to the Duchy of
Rome, and hence to the popes. Whether the Lombards
were now more than ever convinced of the weakness of the
exarch, or whether their own power was by this time more

1 “Cujus adventum cognoscentes militia totius Italiz tumultuose

convenit apud hanc Romanam civitatem, volens praefatum exarchum
tribulate assaf

2 Lb,

JOHN VI. 107

consolidated, they were at this period engaged in extending
their frontiers in all directions at the expense of those of the
exarch. Gisulf I., Duke of Benevento (686-706), increased
his sway by getting possession of the towns of Sora, Arpinum
and Arx from the Duchy of Rome, thus advancing the
border of his own duchy to the river Liris; and bursting
into the Campagna, perhaps in the year 702, advanced as
far as a place which the Liber Pontzficalis calls ‘ Horrea, }
and which Dr. Hodgkin thinks? to be the great granary
of Puteoli, and there pitched his camp. He advanced,
plundering, burning, and carrying off captives; and,
pathetically adds the papal biographer, “there was no
one who could resist him.”? But, as usual, there was
one able and willing to come to the succour of the poor
Italians—the Pope of Rome. John VI. sent to the camp
of Gisulf several priests furnished with large sums of money,
and they redeemed all the captives he had taken, and in-
duced the warlike duke to return to his own country.
Such arts as these are the only ones known to hzstory by
which more and more temporal power was acquired by the
Popes, or rather forced into their hands.
His exertions in behalf of St. Wilfrid have already been Decrees in

; f f
set down.6 To Brithwald, “whom by the authority ® of the St. Wilfrid,

703-704.

1 Muratori, Amnad., ad an. 702, says of the name “probabilmente é€
fallato.” It may have been at the fifth milestone on the Via Latina,
where in the days of Gregory II. was ‘fundus Horrea. Jaffé, 2227
(1715).

2 Ttaly, etc., vi. p. 336.

3 “Nullusque extitisset, qui ei potuisset resistere.” Cf Paulus,
Hist. Lang., vi. 27; and Joan. Diac., Vit. Epp. Neap., Part 1, ap.
Muratori, R. Z. S., tom, 1, who follow the Z. P.

4 “Pontifex, missis Sacerdotibus, cum apostolicis donariis, «s7versos
captivos de eorum manibus redemit, et illum cum suo stolo (exercitu)
ad propria repedare fecit.” (Z. P. Cf. Paulus, 20.)

6 Sup,p. 34. Cf Eddius; Bede, v. 19; Malmesb., Gest. Pont., ap.
Migne, t. 179, p. 1568. Montalembert, Monks of the West, iv. p. 323 f.

6 Eddius, in vit. S. Wilf, c. 54.

108 JOHN Vi.

eA Prince of the Apostles we have confirmed as Archbishop

pectpishon (of Canterbury),” John VI. sent the pallium.

Except that he held the usual ordinations of priests,
deacons and bishops for‘ various places, and made certain
additions or improvements to a few of the churches, we

Deathof know no more of John VI. but that he was buried at St.

ohn VI.
: Peter’s on January II, 705.

JOHN VIL

A.D. 705-707.
———_—— $0-—_—_

Sources.—The very short life in the Z. P., with incidental notices
in Paul the Deacon, etc. The excavations which, in the course
of the last few months, have brought to light the palace, etc., of
John VII. have been well described by Mr. Rushworth in the
Guardian and Times newspapers, and by Federici, Archivio
della R. Societa Rom. di storia patria, xxiii. 517 f. See Papers
of the British School at Rome, vol. i. London, Macmillan, 1902,
and the review of the same, ap. Lng. Hist. Rev., Apr. 1903.

EMPERORS OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Tiberius III. (Apsimar), Aripert II., 700-712. Theophylact, 702-709.
698-705.
Justinian IJ. (restored),
705-711.

ON March 1, 705, was consecrated as Bishop of Rome Neer
another Greek, John VII. of an illustrious family, the character,
son of Blatta and Plato,! who “had held the high office
of Cura Palatiz, an office which, in Constantinople itself,
was often held by the son-in-law of the emperor. Plato
had in that capacity presided over the restoration of the

old imperial palace at Rome, which was now the ordinary

a Oh, Jet,

John and
the Quini-
sext de-

crees, 706.

110 JOHN VII.

residence of the exarch’s lieutenant.”1 The epitaphs to
his father and mother, composed by John himself, when
rector of the patrimony on the Appian Way (687), have
come down to us. They were inscribed “with a broken
heart to a most loving and incomparable mother, and to
the kindest of fathers, by their son John.” The care which
Plato bestowed on the restoration of the old palace of
the Czsars on the Palatine, a building all too large for
the residence of the Dux Rome, his son, as we shall
see, devoted to the repair of Rome’s churches. And to
this work, besides experience gained from his father, he
brought a well-trained mind. For, as his biographer assures
us, he was a man of very profound learning* and great
eloquence, but, as is not unfrequently to be observed in
learned speakers, his courage was not on a par with his
oratory. This Pope was remarkable for his devotion to
the Mother of God. The title he was most proud of
was ‘Mary’s servant.’

Soon after John became Pope the cruel Rhinotmetus
(Justinian II.) succeeded in again obtaining possession of
the imperial throne. By lavish promises he won over
to his cause Terbel, the king of the Bulgarians. He
effected an entrance into the ‘Blacherne’ quarter of
Constantinople through an aqueduct. His rivals, Leontius
and Apsimar, were beheaded after being exposed to the
greatest ignominies. The patriarch Callinicus, who, to his
credit, had shown his hate of the cruel character of the
tyrant, was deprived of his eyes and sent to Rome. When
he had glutted his appetite for revenge with the blood

1 Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, vi. p. 364, quoting Plato’s
epitaph (which was still visible in the fifteenth century in the Church
of St. Anastasia), from Duchesne’s ed. of the Liber Pont, i. 386.

2 “Vir eruditissimus, et facundus eloquentia ....sed humana
fragilitate timidus.” Z. P.

JOHN VIL III

of his enemies, the brutal Justinian, either in the year
706, or perhaps more likely in the early part of the next,
sent to John by the hands of two metropolitan bishops the
same Tomes (tomi), six in number, which he had sent before
to Pope Sergius; and in which, adds the Book of the
Popes? “were contained various points against the Church
of Rome.” Through the bishops, and through a letter
which he despatched to the Pope at the same time,
Justinian adjured John to assemble a council, to examine
the decrees of the Quinisext Council, and to approve what
he thought fit and to reject the rest. Whether it was that
the report of the unbounded cruelty and fierceness of the
‘Slit-nosed’ emperor had struck terror into John, his
biographer says that, ‘timid through human frailty, the
Pope sent back the ‘ Tomes’ without attaching any note at
allto them. If he dared not condemn them, he would not
approve them ; for from the little we know of the affair it
would be scarcely fair to argue that here silence gave
consent. Perhaps John felt he had not the requisite
strength to enter into a contest with Justinian, for we are
told that he did not live long after this incident.?

If we may trust the old eleventh century chronicler
Herman Contractus, it was in the year 707 that there took
place the restoration of the ‘patrimony’ of the Cottian
Alps to the See of Rome, spoken of by Bede and others.

1 Cf. Niceph. in Chron.; Theoph. in Chron, ad. an. 696-8.
“ Multos ex Apsimari militibus repertos, tam eos, qui pro ipso aliquid
moliebantur, quam qui guzetem agerent, omnes interfecit .... ex
civium posthac militumque ordine xumerum propemodum infinitum
coegit perire.”

22. P. “In quibus (tomis) diversa capitula Romanz ecclesize
contraria scripta inerant.” These ‘tomes’ were, of course, the six
copies of the Quinisext Council; one being for the Pope himself, one
for the emperor, and one for each of the four patriarchs of
Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

3 “Post quae non diu in hac vita duravit.” Z. P.

The restor-
ation of the
patrimony
of the
Cottian

Alps, 707.

112 JOHN VIL

According to Paul the Deacon,! the fifth province of
Italy went by the name of the ‘Cottian Alps, and
included the western part, at least, of the ancient province
of Liguria. In this province the Roman Church had of
old large possessions, which had been seized by the
Lombards. St. Gregory speaks of property belonging to
the Roman Church in the neighbourhood of Genoa (Ep.
xi, 6, 14, al. 4, 3, etc.). It was all confiscated when
Rothari laid waste with fire (¢xcendio concremans) and
sword the whole littoral from Tuscan Luna to the
territories of the Franks, and ordered the cities he had
dismantled to be called villages! Of these lands Aripert
II. made restitution,? sending notice thereof to Rome in a
deed written in letters of gold. The exact nature of the
rights possessed by the popes of this period over these
and their other possessions is not easy to define. But
there is no doubt, as it has been remarked before, that
they (the popes) had more than mere rights of ownership
over their ‘patrimonies.’ They had a considerable amount
of jurisdiction in them, which they exercised, indeed, in
submission to the emperor. Still, however, it was there ;
and it greatly facilitated the passing of many of the said
patrimonies under the complete power of the popes in the
course of this century.

ae a Jaffé quotes a very interesting fragment® of a letter of
onn to e€

Bishop of

England se

on the Rizal, tin TOr Ch 1S.

ese ie * Bede, De sex @tat., ad an. 708, writes: “Aripertus, rex Longo-
705-7. bardorum, multas cohortes (villas) et patrimonia Alpium Cottiarum

quee quondam ad jus pertinebant apostolicze sedis, sed a Longobardis
multo tempore fuerant ablata, restituit juri ejus; et hanc donationem
aureis scriptam litteris, Romam direxit.”. Cf Paul the Deacon, Z. They,
vi. 23 (¢f vi. 48, where he narrates the confirmation of this deed of
restitution by King Liutprand), and the Z. P. For the devastations of
Rothari, cf Fredegar, c. 71 ; Paul, iv. 45.

3 Regest. Pont., 2145 (1647). The fragment is to be found ap. Baluze,

JOHN Vii. - £13

the Pope to the English bishops and clergy, which
shows the well-known love! of the Anglo-Saxons in
general for fine apparel, and the consequent disinclination
on the part of the Anglo-Saxon clerics in particular to
renounce the secular dress and to adopt the more sober
ecclesiastical costume. John describes how, on one
occasion, when all the Anglo-Saxon notables who were
then in Rome came to meet him, what he said had such
weight? with his hearers that, on the vigil of St. Gregory,
all the Anglo-Saxon clerics laid aside their ample lay
garments and put on the cassock according to the Roman
custom. He concludes by exhorting those to whom he is
writing to go and do likewise.

This Pope’s name is connected with two of Italy’s, Toren
we might say the world’s, most famous monasteries : of Farfa
the monastery of Farfa, situated on the Salarian road, Subiaco,
and on the high ground between the valleys of Tibur
and the Velino, and the monastery of Subiaco, built on
that wild spot on the Anio, where St. Benedict went to
pass his youth in solitude, and on which was afterwards
built, by the saint, one of .those Benedictine monasteries
to which European civilisation owes so much. It was
at the request of Faroald, Duke of Spoleto,? that John
confirmed the possessions and gave various privileges
to the monastery of Farfa (June 30, 705), The monastery
of Subiaco, like its offshoot of Monte Cassino, destroyed

Miscell., i. 400. The Pope writes to the English, “auctoritate
apostolica.” The affair may belong to the reign of John VI., and
to the year 704 (cf. Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 264).

_ 1Cf Lingard, Anglo-Sax. Church, \. p. 210 f., ed. Baker, London.

2 “ Apostolicee sententia usque adeo sedis prevaluit, ut voluntarie
omnes Anglorum clerici.... laicalem habitum deponentes, talares
tunicas induerent” (Jaffé, 20.).

“Chrom Farf, ap. Murat. RO EPSG oir i) 331. “Some would
question the authenticity of this bull.

VOr, LPT. IL 8

John’s

* church
decora-
tions.’

Sancta
Maria
Antiqua.

114 JOHN VIl.

by the Lombards (601), and abandoned for over one
hundred years, was restored by this Pope, who sent
thither the abbot Stephen for the purpose.’

In his short reign John did a good deal in the way
of church beautifying and restoration in different parts
of the city. Among his other works in this direction,
he built (706) a chapel to Our Lady in St. Peter’s, and
covered its walls with mosaics, which our Bede? describes
as of ‘admirable workmanship, though, apart from con-
siderations of the age in which they were executed, they
are indifferent enough. In the centre of one of the two
groups of figures stands the Blessed Virgin in the garb
of a Byzantine empress, and at her right the Pope,
his head crowned by a square nimbus, “and the model
of the chapel in his hands. Traces of figures, together
with the ancient inscription, may still be discovered in
the crypt of the Vatican.”* The inscription ran: “John,
an unworthy bishop, the servant of the Blessed Mother
of God, carried out this work.” “The chapel,” continues
Gregorovius, “was pulled down in 1639 (1606?); and the
remains of the mosaics removed to St. Maria in Cosmedin.
Here the time-honoured relics still remain, built into
the walls of the sacristy, and, rough in execution though
they be, bear the stamp of an age, the pious simplicity
and child-like faith of which it is scarcely possible for us
to understand.”

Other entries in the Book of the Popes have been

1 Cf. Murat., Annal,, ad an. 707. Gregorovius, Rome in the Middle
Ages, ii. 200.

Ener iad WAC an FOS. GC fttawien

® Gregorovius, 74., p. 195. “B. Det Genttricis servus, Joannes
indignus Episcopus fecit.” The ‘time-honoured relics’ are not all in
St. Maria in Cosmedin ; some are in the Vatican crypts, others in the
Lateran Museum, and in the Church of St. Mark’ in Florence
(Ditehesneray 2. 1.380):

JOHN VIt. 115

remarkably illustrated within the last few months. One
passage, for instance, runs: “He adorned with frescoes
(pictura) the basilica of the Holy Mother of God, which
is known as ¢he Old; and alongside of it he built a palace
(episcopium) for himself, and there he lived and died.” — It
is curious that John’s home should be brought to light by
descendants of the people about whose clothes he was
solicitous, viz., by the British School of Archeology at
Rome. Though, to anything but the credit of the nation,
our School only came into existence in November 1899,
it has not been idle since its birth. Its work in
connection with S. Maria Antiqua had best be told in
the words of the letter, already cited, of Mr. Rushforth,
the head of the School :

“The Church (S. Maria Antiqua) was installed in the
ancient buildings (buried deep till a year ago beneath the
garden of the now destroyed S. Maria Liberatrice), which
occupied the space between the back wall of the colossal
brick structure known as the Temple of Augustus and the
substructures of the northern angle of the Palatine.
Passing the Temple of Castor on the right, and the House
of the Vestals, with the fountain and shrine of Juturna on
the left, one reaches the precincts of the church. Its plan
presents the regular features of a great Roman house or
palace. Passing through the open portico which extended
along the facade, one enters, as in the Flavian Palace on
the Palatine, a great hall with niches (alternately round
and square) for colossal statues in its walls. The door at
its opposite end leads into an open court or peristyle,
beyond which is the usual arrangement of a big room
(tablinum), with one side completely open to the court, in
the middle flanked by two smaller chambers. It is
impossible, in this place, to discuss the origin and history

1 Quoted by the Zad/eZ, June 22, 1901.

116 JOHN Vii.

of these buildings. But it may be taken that, in their
present form, they belong to the time of Hadrian, and that,
probably, their vazson d’étre is the spacious staircase, or
rather, incline, which leads from the left-hand corner of
the peristyle to the summit of the Palatine. They formed,
in fact, the state entrance to the Palace from the Forum,
or, to put it in another way, they may be thought of as
part of the Palace brought down for the sake of convenience
to the level of the Forum.

“Such was the building which had to be adapted to the
uses of achurch.. The ¢ablinum became the sanctuary, the
chambers which flanked it side chapels. The central
space of the peristyle was enclosed with low screens and
formed the choir, while the great entrance hall served as
the atrium. It is by no means clear that the open space of
the peristyle was ever roofed in, even after it had been
turned into a choir by being enclosed with a low wall,
covered with paintings and fitted on the inside with a
marble seat, which ran all the way round, except where on
the left it was broken by the staircases which led to the
‘ambo. When did this transformation take place, or begin
to take place? Presumably not before the middle of the
‘sixth century, the period of the Byzantine conquest. That
‘was the age when the forms of the ancient world, being
‘extinct, the Church first took possession of the disused
public buildings. It is therefore not surprising to learn
that the earliest mention of S. Maria Antiqua occurs in
‘a catalogue of Roman churches made in the Byzantine
period, possibly about the middle of the seventh century
(De Rossi, Roma Sotteranea, i. 143). ‘Moreover, it is
significant that we hear of it for the first time in the
Liber Pontificalis at the beginning of the eighth cen-
tury. Can we believe that the earlier part of the book,
with its copious information about the oldest churches,

JOHN VII. FI7

would have omitted this one if it had existed very long
before ?

“ But if the church was so recent as the sixth or seventh
century, how are we to account for its title Antiqua?
The difficulty is increased by the fact that while ‘Old
St. Mary’s’ ought to have a ‘ New St. Mary’s’ correspond-
ing to it, the only S. Maria Nova we know was the church
which replaced S. Maria Antiqua in the ninth century.
They never existed side by side. There were other
churches in Rome bearing the name of the Virgin much
older than the one in the Forum, but they differed from
it in this, that originally they were designated in quite
another way. S. Maria Maggiore was the Basilica Liberii
or Sicinini; S. Maria trans Tiberim was the Basilica or
Titulus of Julius or of Callixtus. The latter does not
appear as S. Maria trans Tiberim before the seventh
century, whereas S. Maria Maggiore, after the restoration
by Sixtus III. (432-440), and as late as John I. (523-526),
is regularly mentioned in the Liber Pontificalis as St.
Maria simply. Can we believe that this would have been
so if S. Maria Antiqua had been already in existence?
As common experience shows, ‘old’ in these cases of
nomenclature means not absolutely, but relatively, old;
and the most reasonable supposition seems to be that,
while S. Maria Maggiore, as one of the greater basilicas,
stands apart in a category of its own, S. Maria Antiqua
was so called because it was the first church dedicated
ab initio to the Virgin—z.e., before the foundation of S.
Maria Rotunda (the Pantheon), and before the church in
the Trastevere acquired its new name, both in the seventh
century. This is precisely the order given in the seventh
century catalogue referred to above, where the Lateran is
followed by S. Maria Major, S. Anastasia, S. Maria Antiqua,
S. Maria Rotunda, S. Maria Trastiberis, etc.

118 JOHN VII.

“We learn from the Book of the Popes that John VII.
(705-707) decorated the church with paintings, and gave it
a new azbo. Though discarded at a later date, the base of
this amdo has actually been found in the church. It bears
the inscription “Johannes servu(s) scze Marie,” and at the
opposite end "Iwavvov dovAou tis Oewroxov. The style and
lettering, as well as the sentiment, is exactly the same as
that of the Pope’s epitaph still preserved in the crypt of
St. Peter—Johannis servi sanctze Marie. His interest
in this church was not solely due to his devotion to Mary.
His father Plato, the cura palatit urbis Rome, as his
official title ran, had lived in the imperial palace on the hill
above, and when he died in 687 John had put up a
monument to his memory in S. Anastasia, which mentions
his restoration of the long staircase, perhaps the one which
we still see connecting the Forum with the Palatine (De
Rossi, /uscr. Chr., ii. p. 442).

“When John became Bishop of Rome in 705 the Lateran
had fallen into decay, and the Lzber Pontificalis describes
how, above S. Maria, episcopium quantum ad se construere
malutt, wlicque pontificatt sut tempus vitam finivit. Brought
into intimate relations with the church by means of the
ascent before mentioned, John began to take a special
interest in it. In addition to his gift of the ambo, he
decorated it with paintings, and it becomes important to
try to discover which, if any, of the considerable remains of
painting in the church may be attributed tohim. The only
parts which can be dated with certainty belong to the
middle of the eighth century and later. But there is good
reason for thinking that the pictures on the walls of the
square sanctuary are some of those executed under John.
It is to be regretted that the difference of material and
their fragmentary character make it difficult to draw any
satisfactory comparison between the scattered relics of

JOHN VII. 1Ig

John’s works in mosaic from the old St. Peter’s and these
paintings. The wall above the small apse, which must
have contained the altar, shows at the summit the Cruci-
fixion. On either side the white-robed elders are offering
their crowns, as in the well-known mosaics at St. Paul’s
without the Walls and at S. Prassede. Below is a band of
quotations in Greek from the Prophets, relating to the
Crucifixion. Another band of adoring saints follows, and
then, cut in the middle by the arch of the apse, we see a
row of four popes. Everything here is much damaged,
but two important details are certain. One of the popes
on the right is St. Martin, who died in 655, and the one on
the extreme left, though his name has perished, has the
square nimbus, and is therefore, in all probability, the donor
of the pictures—z.e., John VII. The apse itself, with a
colossal figure of Christ, has been painted again at a later
date, for we can still see the head with its square nimbus
and the name of Paul I. (757-767). Below the row of popes
is a fragment of the dedicatory inscription: S(an)c(d)e
Det [genttr\ct sem[perque Virgint Mar\e. Below this
the walls on either side of the apse have been decorated
again and again. A Madonna robed and crowned like a
Byzantine empress, the four Evangelists, the four Fathers,
have replaced one another at different times. The side
walls of the sanctuary have been decorated at least twice ;
but the upper surface, which corresponds to the pre-
sumed work of John VII., represented the Gospel history
with the Crucifixion on the main wall as its climax. The
last scene on the left side wall is the procession to
Calvary. To judge by the remains, the paintings on the
screens which enclosed the choir and presbytery were
of the same style and epoch. They were taken from
the Old Testament, and were no doubt treated as types.
The best preserved are David’s victory over Goliath,

120 JOHN VIL

and Isaiah announcing to Hezekiah his approaching
death.

“ The chapel to the right of the sanctuary contains many
single figures of saints. The place of honour is occupied
by Stephen. The rest, like the inscriptions, are mainly
Greek. Cosmas and Damian, Abbacyrus and John,
Procopius, Panteleémon, Celsus, are among the best
preserved. The chapel to the left is the most perfect
in the whole building. Some of the painting is as fresh
as when it was executed, and equally important is the
fact that it can be dated with precision. Below a Cruci-
fixion, in which the living Redeemer is represented clothed
in a long, sleeveless garment, a seated Madonna is flanked
by SS. Peter and Paul, Quiricus and Julitta, and the square-
nimbed, and therefore contemporary, portraits of Pope
Zacharias (741-752) and the donor, who, as his inscription
tells us, is Theodotus, przmicerius defensorum and adispen-
sator of the draconta of St. Mary quz appellatur antiqua.
The pictures on the side walls represent the story of
Quiricus and Julitta as given in the later ‘ Acta.’

“The outer wall of the church on the side next the
Palatine has retained its paintings in a fair state of
preservation. The wall surface was divided into four
bands; a dado representing hangings, a row of life-size
saints, while the upper tiers were devoted to the Old
Testament history, beginning, no doubt, with the Creation.
Of the highest section all that has survived is the story of
the Flood. On the lower we get the end of the life of
Jacob and the history of Joseph as far as the fulfilment
of the dreams of the chief butler and the baker. Probably
the series was continued on the opposite side of the church,
but the remains there are too scanty to enable us to say
this with certainty. In the centre of the row of saints is
a seated figure of our Lord. On His left are the saints of

JOHN VIL 121

the Greek world: John Chrysostom, Gregory, Basil, Peter
of Alexandria, Cyril, Epiphanius, Athanasius, Nicholas,
Erasmus. The West, and especially Rome, is represented
on His right : Clement, Silvester, Leo, Alexander, Valentine,
Abundius (?), Euthymius, Sebastian (?), George, Gregory
(the Great). The names are in Greek, whereas the inscrip-
tions on the Old Testament scenes above are in Latin.
Considerations of style make it probable that all this work
was executed in the middle or latter half of the eighth
century.

“ The outer church or atrium was also completely covered
with paintings, but mere fragments have survived. The
best-preserved picture is that of a Madonna (inscribed
Maria Regina), flanked by six sacred personages, of which
the outer one on the left is a contemporary pope with the
square nimbus. Unfortunately, all that can be certainly
made out of his name is the termination ‘anus’ <A
detached building outside the entrance to the church was
apparently dedicated to the Forty Martyrs, who are re-
presented in the apse as immersed in the lake, while on
the left wall they appear as glorified with the Saviour in
their midst.

“The church had not a long history. We learn from
the Book of the Popes that in the middle of the ninth
century Benedict III. (855-858) bestowed various offerings
in basilica beate Dei genetricis gui vocatur Antiqua quam a
fundamentis Leo papa (ie., his predecessor Leo IV.) vzam
Juxta sacram construxerat. And once again, Nicholas I.
(858-867) was the first to decorate with paintings this new
Church of St. Mary, gue primitus Antiqua nunc autem
Nova vocatur. The new church is perfectly well known:
it is S. Francesca Romana, built originally in part of the
colonnade surrounding Hadrian’s temple of Venus and
Rome, The meaning is obvious. For some reason the

122 JOHN VII.

diaconia of S. Maria Antiqua was transferred to a new
site, where, for a time, it preserved its old name, until, as
being a new construction, it got to be known popularly as
‘New St. Mary’s.” That reason can only have been some
catastrophe which overwhelmed the original church. It
was not fire, for there are no traces of fire in the building,
But it may well have been that a day came when the
towering structures at the north-west angle of the Palatine
toppled over the edge of the hill and buried the church
beneath their ruins. Natural decay is quite enough to
have brought about this result, just as we know that in
the time of Hadrian I. the Church of SS. Sergius and
Bacchus was crushed beneath the falling ruins of the
Temple of Concord. But perhaps we can localise the
catastrophe more precisely. The Book of the Popes
carefully records the occurrence of earthquakes in Rome.
In the period with which we are concerned one took place
under Leo III. (795-816), but apparently it was of minor
importance and only affected seriously the basilica of
St. Paul. But halfa century later, under Leo IV., there
was a terrible convulsion, z#a ut omnia elementa concussa
viderentur ab omnibus, and Leo IV. was the Pope who
rebuilt S. Maria Antiqua on the new site in the Via
Sacra. It is difficult to resist the conclusion that we
have here the cause of the abandonment of the old
building.”

Before leaving this interesting subject, it may be noted,
from Federici’s article, that traces of John’s palace are to
be seen in the remains of medizval constructions by the
side of S. Maria Antiqua, by the side of the apse of the
chapel adjoining it, and close to the temple of Castor and
Pollux and the sacred fountain of Juturna. Tiles of the
Romano-Byzantine period have been found stamped with
the name of John, tIQANN(ys). John of course, may

JOHN VII. 123

have been the name of the maker; but it may have been
that of the son of Plato, John VII.

John closed his short but ‘full’ reign in 707, and was
buried! in St. Peter’s, before the altar of the chapel of Our
Lady, about which mention has been made. He died in
the palace which he had himself built,2 and which, before
Mr. Rushforth’s discovery, De Rossi had mistakenly
identified with “certain ruins at the foot of the Palatine
hill, “which are to be seen on his right by anyone who walks
from the Arch of Titus towards the Coliseum. His only
epitaph was: “(The place) of John, the servant of Holy
Mary.”

MZ. Ee * 1b. 3 Grisar, Analecta, i. 127, 167-8.

Sisinnius,
Jan. 15,
708.

oye Brey aN tes lus
A.D. 708.

Source. —Vhe very short ‘life’ in the Z. 2

ares ash ey

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Justinian II. (restored), Aripert II., 700-712. Theophylact, 702-709.
705-711. :

ALL that we know of this Pope, who only reigned twenty
days, can be told in a few words. A Syrian, and the son of
one John, he was consecrated on January 15 (a Sunday),
708. So afflicted was he with the gout that he could not
feed himself. Still, says his biographer, he was? of firm
mind, and had a care for the inhabitants of this city. Both
these characteristics he displayed in the order which he
gave to prepare lime for the restoration of the city walls.
To this repairing of the walls he was doubtless moved,
not merely by the nearer approach of the Lombards, but
by fear of the rapidly-advancing power of the Saracens;
and perhaps by a wish to strengthen the city against the
arbitrary and often violent action of the emperors at
Constantinople. Sudden death, however, prevented him

17, P. “Constans animo, et curam agens pro habitatoribus hujus
civitatis.”

SISINNIUS i2s

from ¢arrying out his design. From the simple words,
“Qui et calcarias pro restauratione murorum jussit
decoquere,” Dr. Hodgkin, in a style quite unworthy of
the man himself and his work, takes occasion to remark,
“An evil precedent truly. How many of that silent
population of statues which once made beautiful the
terraces of Rome have perished in these same papal lime-
kilns?” No matter how willing Sisinnius might have
been to make the ‘silent population’ defend the walls
as well as the ‘speaking population, the fact is, as Dr.
Hodgkin, himself quoting Gregorovius, observes in a note,”
the great general Belisarius had practically got all the
military service possible out of the ‘silent population,’
as his soldiers used them for various military purposes.
Sisinnius consecrated a bishop for Corsica, and was pe
buried in St. Peter’s, February 4, 708. Feb, 708,
Here one cannot but ask, Why were men in such a feeble
state of health elected? Why was the city to be kept con-
stantly in the state of excitement caused by elections?
A healthy excitement indeed, if gratified at sufficiently
remote intervals, but unhealthy if constant. For then
either the excitement becomes feverish, or it plays itself
out altogether; both which results are as injurious to
states as to individuals. In the case of Sisinnius the
answer to these queries may be, that the electors knew |
very well on the one hand that gout does not kill a man
all at once; and on the other they may have had proof
of the energy and strength of mind of their invalid
candidate. The fact that Sisinnius at once made prepara-
tions to strengthen the city would serve to show ® that he
could read the times, and that he foresaw the troubles
which the Lombards and then the Saracens were soon to

1 Ttaly, etc., vi. 2 16., Vv. 302.
3 It shows, too, the temporal power he must have had in the city.

126 SISINNIUS

bring on Rome and the popes. It may be, then, that
Sisinnius was elected simply because he was an able and
proper person, and because there was no suspicion that the
gout had obtained the hold on him that it proved to have
done.

On the other hand, there are not wanting authors who
assert that the sole ground of his election was that he was
an Oriental. They point to the fact that from John V.,
who was a Syrian, to Pope Zachary, who was a Greek,
there was only one Western Pope, the Roman Gregory II.
These authors believe that this succession of Orientals was
brought about by the machinations of the exarchs, in the
interests of their masters. If, however, such were indeed
the case, it only remains to point out that once again
history shows us ‘man proposing but God disposing’ ;
for these Oriental popes were very estimable men, a credit
to the Papacy, and, as far as the records of history
enable us to see, anything but creatures of the lords of
Constantinople.

CONSTANTINE.
A.D. 708-715.
a

Sources.—A rather longer ‘life’ in the Z. P. Bede and Malmes.
bury are the authorities for the Pope’s relations with England.
Agnellus of Ravenna (archbishop of Ravenna), who wrote the
history of its bishops, about the middle of the ninth century,
in a spirit hostile to the popes and in a very poor style,
gives us some information about Ravennese affairs. His work
is to be found in Muratori’s &. /. S., il.. and in the Zon. Germ.
fZist., edited by Holder-Egger.

EMPERORS OF THE KINGS OF THE EXARCHS OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Justinian II. (Rhinot- Aripert II., 700-712. Theophylact, 702~709.1
metus), 705-711. Ausprand, 712. John Rizocopus,
Philippicus (Bardanes), Liutprand, 712-744. 710-713.
FTI 703: Scholasticus, 713-726.

Anastasius II., 713-715.

OF Constantine we know nothing before he became Con-

stantine
Pope, except that, like his immediate predecessor (could one
. t
he have been his brother?), he was a Syrian and the son Pope,
March 25,

1 It is granted that the dates for the exarchs of this period are very pe
conjectural. All that is known with any degree of certainty with
regard to the period of the rule of these exarchs is that it was in
progress at the same time as that of those popes in connection with
whom they (the exarchs) are mentioned by the papal biographers.

Felix of
Ravenna,
708.

128 CONSTANTINE

of John. ‘The mildest of men,’! he was consecrated March
25, 708.

The first act that is recorded of Constantine is his
consecrating Felix, the successor of Damian (consecrated
by Sergius I.), as archbishop of Ravenna.

The subsequent conduct of Felix will be more readily
understood if it be premised that it appears from the Lzder
Diurnus (formulas 73-4-5) that the bishops immediately
dependent on the See of Rome (the suburbicarian bishops)
had, after their consecration, to sign three formulas and
give them into the hands of the Pope. The first, called
‘promissio fidei, was a detailed profession of faith, and
had to be signed by the new bishop and his priests.
The second, the ‘cautio, was an undertaking to observe
certain rules of ecclesiastical government. It had to be
dictated by the bishop to a notary, in presence of the
primicerius and secundicerius of the notaries of the Roman
Church, and then signed by the bishop and _ several
witnesses. The third document, known as the ‘indiculum’
was a promise not to be connected with any undertaking
against the unity of the Church or the security of the
Roman empire. The ‘indiculum’ had to be written out
by the bishop himself, and placed by him in the
‘confession’ of St. Peter.

Felix had no sooner received the desired consecration,
than, thinking he had humbled himself quite enough
by coming to Rome to be ordained, he refused to sign the
accustomed acts of submission (cautiones) to the Holy

See, ze. probably, he refused to sign the second document

just mentioned, the ‘cautio’ strictly so called. Backed by
the secular power, “by the power of the judges,’? as
1 “Vir valde mitissimus.” JZ, P.

2 “Sed per potentiam judicum exposuit ut voluit.”” Z.P. We have
here followed Duchesne literally.

CONSTANTINE 129

the papal biographer expresses it, Felix refused to
comply with the Pope’s demands. The parchment, how-
ever, on which the ‘indiculum’ had been duly written,
was placed by the Pope himself in the ‘confession’ of St.
Peter. And we have it on the authority of the same
historian that, a few days after, it was found all black,
and, as it were, scorched. In the sacking and partial
burning of the city of Ravenna (in the following year,
709) by the troops of Justinian, the papal biographer
sees the hand of God punishing its people and arch-
bishop for their pride in wishing to be more independent
of the Pope. Why Justinian treated Ravenna in this
manner cannot be precisely ascertained. According
to Agnellus it was because some of the Ravennese had
taken part in the rebellion against him in 695.1 At
any rate, it is certain that he put to death all the chief
men of the city, deprived Archbishop Felix of his sight,
and sent him into exile somewhere in Pontus, very likely
to Cherson. However, when Justinian finished his violent
career by a violent death (711), the poor sightless arch-
bishop was allowed to return to his See. Humbled by his
terrible sufferings, Felix submitted to the Pope, sent, of
his own free will, the required ‘oath of obedience’ (cauzézo),
and died (723) in communion with the See of Rome?

1 Other motives are suggested by Muratori, Ammal., ad an. 709 ;
Hodgkin, /¢aly, etc., vi. 372.

2 “Felix .... ab exilio reductus, pcenitentia motus, licet oculorum
lumine privatus, tamen ad propriam rediit sedem. Et solita que ab
universis in scrinio Episcoporum fiunt indicula, et fidei expositionem et
hic confessus est, sicque reconciliationis promeruit absolutionem.”
L. P. Cf. Agnellus, in his life of Felix ; he is, however, silent on the
subject of the differences between Felix and the Pope. From his
epitaph (ap. Agnel. in vit., c. 7) it would appear that on his return he

not only made his submission, but acted in thorough harmony with
the Holy See:
“Culmen apostolicum colere summe novit
Cujus ope fretus profana dogmata pell(i)t.”
VOLS iy PT, 11. 9

Kings

Coenred
and Offa
in Rome,

709.

Ecgwin of
Worcester!

130 CONSTANTINE

The example of Caedwalla, king of the West Saxons,
who, as we have seen, resigned his kingdom and went
to Rome to die, was followed, twenty years after, by
two other Anglo-Saxon kings. Coenred, “who had for
some time (704-709) very nobly governed the kingdom
of the Mercians,” says Bede,) “did a much more noble
act by quitting the throne of his kingdom and going
to Rome (after May 709), where, having received the
tonsure, when Constantine was Pope, and been made a
monk at the shrine of the apostles, he continued to his
last hours in prayer, fastings, and alms-deeds. ... With
him went the son of Sighere, king of the East Saxons,
whose name was Offa, a youth of most lovely age and
beauty, and most earnestly desired by all his nation
to be their king. He, with like devotion, quitted his
(betrothed) wife, lands, kindred and country, for Christ
and for the gospel, that he might receive a hundredfold
in this life and in the next life everlasting (St. Matt. xix.
29). Healso.... receiving the tonsure and adopting a
monastic life, attained the long-wished-for sight of the
blessed apostles in heaven.”

With them, and at their request, there went to Rome,
for the second? time, Ecgwin, the famous bishop of
Worcester.

1H. E., v. 19 (Eng. trans, p. 520). “Coinred qui regno
Merciorum nobilissime tempore aliquanto preefuit, nobilius multo
sceptra regni reliquit. .. . Offa juvenis amantissimz etatis et
venustatis . . . . ad tenenda ... . regni sceptra exoptatissimus
. reliquit uxorem,” etc. Cf. v. 20, ad an. 709. Coenred was
particularly moved (maxime. miserando exitu militis compunctus,
Malms., De Gest. Reg. Ang., i. § 78) to give up the world by witnessing
one of his knights die in despair, after refusing to confess his sins when
sickness had fallen on him, “lest his companions should upbraid him
with having done that for fear of death, which he had refused to do in
health” (Bede, 7. Z.,-v. 13): “Cf LEP.
? Ecgwin had been bishop from 692 (692-717).

CONSTANTINE 131

To get at the truth with regard to the history of
Ecgwin is well-nigh impossible. The biographies! of him
which we possess do not go back beyond the tenth or
eleventh centuries; and the royal charters? and papal
letters which concern him are, for the most part, regarded
as forgeries. However, of the chief facts of his life there
is no reason to doubt. Most of them are vouched for
by his charter of foundation of the abbey of Evesham
(714), which has been preserved 3 for us by one of his bio-
graphers, Prior Dominic. And of this charter Mr Macray,
the editor of Dominic’s Lzfe for the Rolls series, writes
(p. xx): “The version (of Ecgwin’s charter) in our text
claims so decidedly to be a transcript, “paene verbum ex
verbo, sicut ipsemet vir sanctus in cartis suis ex maxima
parte scribendo est prosequutus,” that its genuineness, as
a whole, can only be disputed either by accusing the
prior of a deliberate forgery, or by imputing to him an
almost incredible ignorance of the age ang character of
the document which he used.”

Ecgwin’s first visit to Rome was the more romantic.
His people, finding that he never ceased denouncing their
evil ways, contrived to bring upon him the displeasure
both of Rome and the king. To Rome, then, was he
summoned. To show how he was bound by accusations,

1'The anonymous life in the Bollandists (Acta SS., Jan. 1, 707 f.) is °
thought to date from the eleventh century. It is the one used by Prior
Dominic—he was prior in 1125—in compiling his life of Ecgwin, which
takes up the first part of the Chron. Abbat. de Evesham (Rolls Series).
There is an earlier and independent life, which, without any reason, is
said to have been written by Brithwald, which has not yet been printed,
but of which fragments are given in the Acta SS., 2d., p. 711, and in the
preface to the Rolls ed. of the Chron. de. This biography may be
as early as the tenth century.

2 Ap. Kemble, Codex Diplom. A&vi Sax., i. 68f.; Haddan and
Stubbs, Counczés, iii. 281 f.

3 Chron. E., 17f.

132 CONSTANTINE

we are told that he fastened fetters on himself and threw
the key of them into the Avon. Though thus impeded,
Rome was reached at last. A fish caught in the Tiber
was found to contain the key of Ecgwin’s fetters! Taking
this marvel as a sign from heaven, Ecgwin freed himself
from his chains. Then by the Pope also was he declared
innocent of the charges brought against him, and by
his authority was he restored to his see.t

The second time he went to Rome was, as we have
seen, in the company of kings.

His eleventh century biographer relates that, while at
Rome on this occasion, Ecgwin consulted the Pope about
a vision that he had seen, in which he was directed to
build a church in the midst of a wild country, the site of
the present town of Evesham, where there was a “bit of
a chapel (eccleszolam), probably the work,” says Malmesbury,
“of the Britons.” The Pope, in full belief of the genuine-
ness of the vision, wrote? (709) to the archbishop of
Canterbury (Brithwald), and ordered a council to be held
on the spot where Ecgwin had seen the vision of Our
Lady, and a Benedictine monastery to be built there. In
the ‘Lateran church of Our Saviour, whence the letter
of the Pope and the supposed charters of the kings are

1 “ Controversice suze et itineris causa . . . . coram summo pontifice

recitata, discussa . . . . apostolica benedictione et litteris ad sedem
propriam regressus est.” (Ancient life in the Bollandists.)

? “Constat . . . . locum illum, quo nunc coenobium visitur, peculiariter
amasse, incultum antea et spinetis horridum, sed ecclesiolam ab antiquo
habentem, ex opere forsitan Britannorum.” Malms., De Ges¢. Pont., iv.
(ed. Migne, ?. Z., t. 179, p. 1597).

8 See the letter, ap. Haddan and Stubbs. In confirmation of the
gifts of the kings, Constantine wrote: ‘Ipsum locum, quem regia
potestas donavit, et nos, auctoritate Dei et SS. App. et nostra,
donamus” (Acta SS., Jan., p. 709). The two letters of Constantine,
printed in Haddan and Stubbs (iii. 281-3), are there set down as
spurious.

CONSTANTINE 133

dated, the two kings, whom the saint had conducted to
Rome, gave large grants, it is said, towards the expenses
of the new church and monastery, in presence of the
Pope and a great number of Anglo-Saxon bishops and
nobles. The saint returned with great joy to England.
The monastery of Evesham was begun at once; and in
713 a bull! of Pope Constantine placed it under the
special protection of Archbishop Brithwald, and declared
it ‘free from all tyrannical exaction.’

From this history of Ecgwin, if we conclude only that
he made two journeys to Rome in the days of Pope
Constantine, and obtained a ‘ privilege of exemption or pro-
tection’ from that Pontiff for his monastery of Evesham,
we shall certainly not err on the side of credulity.

Towards the close of the year 709,? Constantine left the The Pope

. . ° sets out
harbour of Portus for Constantinople, in obedience to an for the

order from Justinian, who thought to settle the ‘ Quinisext me
question’ more quickly by word of mouth than by
diplomatic correspondence.

As this journey of the Pope is interesting from various
points of view, it seems worth while to give it at the same
length as it has been given to us by the papal biographer.
There accompanied the Pope two bishops, three priests,
Gregory the deacon, afterwards the great Pope Gregory II,
the secundicerius, the first of the ‘defensors, or agents,
the (private) treasurer, the nomenclator, the keeper of the
archives (scrinarius), two subdeacons, and a few inferior

1 Ap. Haddan and Stubbs, Comc., iii.; Mansi, etc. Cf. Chron.
Wigorn., ad an. 708. See Flanagan, //istory of the Church of
England, i. pp. 143-5; Butler’s Lives of the Saints, Jan. 11.

2 7. P. Some readings give ‘Indictione ix.” which would give us
710 instead of 709.

3 Note that Constantine takes the ‘secundicerius.” Hence the
Roman See was still governed in the absence of the Pope by the arch-
priest, the archdeacon and the primicerius of the notaries.

134 CONSTANTINE

clerics. At Naples the Pope was met by the exarch John,
who, on leaving the Pope, went to Rome, and, for some
reason quite unknown to us, proceeded to decapitate four
officials of the papal court—the majordomo, the treasurer,
the ordinator and an abbot. Passing on to Ravenna, he
met with a most shameful death, a just reward, as the
Pope’s biographer thinks, of his great crimes. Meanwhile
the Pope sailed on to Otranto, touching at Sicily, Reggio,
Cotrone and Gallipoli, in Calabria At Otranto, where
he passed the winter, he was visited by the Regzonarius
Theophanius, who brought with him an imperial mandate,
to the effect that, wherever the Pope touched in the course
of his journey, he was to be received by the judges as
though he were the emperor. When the winter was over
the Pope sailed to Constantinople by way of the island of
Ceos. To the seventh milestone from the city went forth
the populace in their holiday attire to meet the Pope. At
their head were the emperor’s young son Tiberius and the
nobility, with the patriarch Cyrus and hisclergy. Mounted
on beautifully caparisoned horses from the imperial stables,
the Pope wearing his mitre (camelaucum), the papal party
were escorted in triumph to the palace of Placidia. This
palace, the usual residence of the papal apocrisiarii when at
Constantinople, stood where once stood old Byzantium,
and where now stands the old Seraglio, and so was
beautifully situated at the eastern end of the promontory

1 From letters of St. Gregory I. (ix. 205-6, al. 99-100), it appears
that there was at Gallipoli a massa Callifolitana belonging to the
Roman Church.

2 “Dum Hydronto moras faceret, , .. . suscepit sigillum imperiale
per Theophanium Regionarium, continentem ita, ut ubi conjungeret
Pontifex, omnes judices ita eum honorifice susciperent, quasi ipsum
preesentialiter Imperatorem viderent.” Z. P.

$ It has been observed that the author of the False Donation of
~ Constantine has drawn upon this description of Pope Constantine’s
entry into Constantinople,

CONSTANTINE 135

which separates the Sea of Marmora from the Golden
Horn, commanding a view of the Asiatic coast. Justinian,
who was then at Nicza in Bithynia, at once wrote to
the Pope to express his joy and thankfulness for his
coming, and begged him to come as far as Nicomedia.
Thither the emperor made his way; and there, with the
imperial crown upon his head, he prostrated himself before
the Pope on his arrival and kissed his feet Then, whilst
all admired the emperor’s humility, the Pope and emperor
embraced. On Sunday the emperor received Holy Com-
munion at the hands of the Pope; and whilst praying
the Pope to intercede for his sins, he renewed? all the
privileges of the Church. As to what passed between
Justinian and the Pope in the course of their conversation,
the biographer of the latter gives us no further information
in his Zzfe of Constantine. But it is the general opinion
of historians, supported by what will be immediately cited
from the life of Gregory II., that the two discussed the
Quinisext Council. By the aid of his deacon Gregory, the
Pope succeeded in satisfying the emperor without com-
promising his See. “When questioned by the emperor on
certain chapters,” says Gregory's (II.) biographer “he
(Gregory) solved every difficulty by his admirable answers.”
As Héfélé remarks,* Constantine took the middle course
which we know that John VIII. afterwards took,’ ze, he
approved those canons of the Trullan synod which were

1 “ Augustus .... cum regno in capite sese prostravit, pedes
osculans Pontificis.” Z.P. Cf V. Bede, De sex etat., ad an. 714.
2 “ Omnia privilegia Ecclesiz renovavit.” ZL. P., and Bede, Zc.

3“A Justiniano .... inquisitus de quibusdam capitulis, optima
responsione unamquamque solvit questionem.” JZ, P. in vit.
Greg. II.

4 Hist. Conc., v. p. 240, Engl. ed. | é
5 Cf the preface of the librarian Anastasius to his translation of the
Acts of the Seventh Gen. Council, ap. Migne, ?, Z., t. 129.

136 CONSTANTINE

not opposed to the faith, good morals, or the decrees of the
Roman Church.

Returnof _ Despite a great deal of sickness on his return journey,
the Pope to

Rome, Oct. the Pope reached Rome (October 24, 711) in safety, to

as the great joy of the people.
Soon after the Pope’s arrival in Rome, the bloodthirsty
Justinian, whom the papal biographer, on the principle,
it would seem, that one ought to speak of men as one
finds them, calls ‘orthodox and most Christian, was slain,
aren and Philippicus (Bardanes), a heretic, reigned in his stead!

and __ The first thing that this ‘luxurious and extravagant’?
accession of

Philippi- prince did was to attempt to revive the Monothelite
ar heresy. By so doing, remarks Finlay,’ “he increased the
confusion into which the empire had fallen (by the
frequent revolutions that had occurred from the date of
the first accession of Justinian II.), and exposed the total
want of character and conscience among the Greek clergy,

Philippicus by re-establishing the Monothelite doctrines in a general

tries to council of the Eastern bishops” (712 AD.). The letter

Mono’ which he sent to the Pope was replete with heresy.
elism,
Examined in a synod* at Rome, the imperial document
was condemned «by the Pope. The Roman people also
took up the question; and by their conduct retorted in a
very direct manner on the action of Bardanes. For one
of the first acts of the emperor had been® to order the

1L.P. Cf. Bede, De sex etat.,ad an. 714, and Paul. Diac., Hzs¢.
Langobard, vi. 31, who says that it was against “the urgent expostula-
tions of the Apostolic Pope” that Justinian “sent an army to Pontus
to apprehend Philippicus.” See Hodgkin, vi. p. 379 f.

2 So he is called by Finlay, Hzs¢. of the Byz. Emp., i. p. 395.

3 Jo. Cf. Theoph., Chrom., ad an. 703, 704; Nicephorus and the
Libell. Synod., ap. Mansi, xii.

4 “Cujus (Philippici) sacram cum pravi dogmatis exaratione Con-
stantinus suscepit, sed cum Apostolicze sedis consilio respuit.” JZ. P.
in vit. Cf Hist. Langob., vi. 34; and Bede, De sex etat., ad an. 716,

5 Cf. Perorat. Agathonis Diac., ap. Mansi, xii..192; and Paul and
Bede, Zc. As we learn from this very ‘peroration, or epilogue, first

CONSTANTINE 137

removal of a representation of the Sixth General Council,
which had been hanging for some years in the vestibule of
the palace, and, on the other hand, he had decreed the rein-
sertion into the diptychs of the names of those who had
been condemned by the Sixth General Council and the re-
erection of their images. The acts of the Sixth Council
he had caused to be burnt and its supporters exiled.
Accordingly Pope and people?! proceeded to erect in the
portico of St. Peter’s a series of pictures illustrative of
the six general councils. They then went a step further,
a step equivalent to declaring themselves independent,
at least of an heretical emperor. They decreed that the
name of Philippicus should not appear in their charters,
nor be stamped on their money. His image was not
placed in the church, nor was he prayed for in the Canon
of the Mass.2 After this, what need for surprise when,
after further provocation, we find the Roman _ people
making themselves wholly independent of the emperor
and placing themselves under the rule of the Pope; and
if we find under Zachary, if not under one of the Gregorys
(II. or IIL), the Pope’s name on the coins of the. Roman
people instead of the emperor's !

Of course the emperor could not tamely submit to see
all this defiance of his authority, and he sent (713) a
certain Peter to replace the Duke Christopher? who had
connived at all these doings. The people, however, took

published by Combefis, Agatho, whilst a young man, had been one of
the assistant secretaries of the Sixth General Council.

1 7, P.; and Paul and Bede, Zc.

27. P. Cf. Bede, Zc. and Paul, 4c. who says, *« Statuit populus
Romanus, ne heeretici imperatoris nomen, aut chartas, aut figuram
solidi, susciperent.”

3 This is the first mention of a ‘Duke’ and a ‘Duchy’ of Rome.
“Dux, ducatus Rome.” ZL. P. The Duke Peter was finally driven
out of Rome in the following reign. See p. 186,

138 CONSTANTINE

Christopher’s part, and a fight took place in the Via Sacra,
in front of the official residence of the governor of Rome,
between what was known as the ‘Christian’ party and
Agatho, who had come to Rome to represent Peter.
Several had been killed on both sides, when the Pope, to
prevent further bloodshed, sent down to the combatants
a body of priests bearing the Book of the Gospels and the
Crucifix. They prevailed on the ‘Christian’ party, which
was far the stronger, to yield. The triumph of the
heretical party was, however, short-lived; for news
reached Rome, a few days after the combat, that the
heretic. Philippicus had been deposed, and that the
orthodox Anastasius reigned in his stead. “Then,” says
the papal biographer from whom we learn these facts,
“great was the joy of the orthodox, while black night? fell
upon the heretic.”

With their imperial sympathies the popes ought to have
been the last persons with whom any emperor should
have quarrelled. This the new emperor, Anastasius,
understood and, by the hands of his exarch Scholasticus,
sent the Pope a profession of faith, in which he de-
clared his orthodoxy and consequent adhesion to the
Sixth General Council. The patriarch John, also, who
had been forcibly placed in the See of Constantinople
by Philippicus, sent a profession of faith to Constantine
(whom he calls the head of the Christian priesthood), in
which he endeavoured to make out that he had always
really been orthodox at heart, but had acted as he had
done to ward off greater evils from the Church. And he
maintained that the decree of faith drawn up at the

! Philippicus was dethroned by a sudden rising of the soldiers, and
blinded on Whitsunday eve, 713. Cf Theoph. in Chron., ad an. 705.

? A night from which Monothelism has never emerged. Cf. Life
of Honorius for the beginnings of Monothelism,

CONSTANTINE 139

pseudo-council of Philippicus was orthodox in sense, if
not at first sight in words. As a sole comment upon
this, let it suffice to point out that it was conduct of the
same weak kind on the part of our own bishops under
Henry VIII. that brought about the so-called ‘ Reforma-
tion’ and all the evils, social and religious—notably the
Civil War—that it has produced in England. The exarch
or the ‘Roman people’ suffered Peter to receive the
dukedom of Rome on condition of his promising not to
molest any of his opponents.?

With Muratori, we may refer to this year the action Benedict
of the holy? archbishop of Milan, Benedict. It would pees
seem that of old, certainly in the fifth century, the
church of Pavia had been subject to that of Milan. For
some cause the right of the archbishops of Milan had been
lost; perhaps because the Lombard kings had obtained
exemption for the bishops of their capital from the
jurisdiction of Milan. And so when it was shown to
Benedict, who wished to recover the rights of Milan,
that for a long time the bishops of Pavia had been
consecrated at Rome, and had been subject only to its
jurisdiction, he waived his contentions once and for all.

After the year 713 we know nothing more of the peath of
life of Constantine. When, in conclusion, it is stated that ce
in his time, as in the time of Pharao, there was a season 7*>
of extraordinary scarcity and one of extraordinary plenty,
and that he consecrated a great many bishops both when

1 ZL. P., Bede and Paul, wdi sup. The letter of the patriarch John
is to be found in the peroration or epilogue of the deacon Agatho, in
Mansi, xii., etc. John (speaking of the Pope) says that what the head
is to the whole body, that ‘the apostolical pre-eminence’ of the Pope
is to the whole Church; and that “according to the canons, he is the
head of the Christian priesthood” (kepadrny rijs kara Xpiordy tepwadvns
Kavoviks twas AoytCducvor).

2 “De quo per universam Italiam bone opinionis fama flagravit,”
Pats, vi 294. Cf LIP, + Muratori, Avzm., ad an. 713.

140 CONSTANTINE

going to and when returning from Constantinople, and
at other times, practically all has here been said that is
known of this “worthy predecessor! of the greater popes
under whom Rome effected her emancipation from the
yoke of Byzantium.”

Constantine was buried in St. Peter’s, April 9, 715.

5 Gregorovius, il. 212,

SL Gr ber OLY male

A.D. 715-731.
——,

Sources.—A contemporary and rather full life in the Z. P. is
our chief source. There were originally two editions of the
biography of Gregory II. The second one seems to have
been drawn up during the pontificate of Pope Zachary (¢
Duchesne, Z. /., 1. p. ccxx f.). In Duchesne’s edition of the
L. P. the two editions are printed in parallel columns, the
one on the left being apparently the older and strictly contem-
porary edition. As Bede uses the biography of Gregory, which
passed into the Z., P., the biography must have been partially
written in Gregory’s lifetime ; for Bede’s De sex efat., finished in
729, contains extracts from it (the biography). Then we have
a number of the Pope’s letters. In addition, there are the
Histories and Chronicles of Paul the Deacon, Bede, Theophanes,
already mentioned, and that of Andrea Dandolo (Doge of Venice,
1343-1354), who preserved earlier documents, ap. &. JZ. S., xii.
By Balzani we are told that Dandolo was “deeply versed in
jurisprudence and history,” and that his chronicle ‘“‘is an
excellent work, for which he made use of every kind of
materials ; and it embraces the whole history of Venice, collected
with great diligence and learning.” Written while he was Doge,
he had, of course, every facility for consulting the State archives ;
and had the other authors of Venetian history perished, ‘‘Dandolo
would have preserved the pith of the earlier works, and the history
of Venice would have come down to us the same.” Another
Venetian author will also be now of use to us, viz., John the
Deacon. This is not the biographer of Pope Gregory the
Great, who was known as //ymonides, but the one who used
to be quoted as Sagorninus, and who was the chaplain of the

Difficulty
and im-
portance
of the ife
i Gregory

142 ST. GREGORY II.

Doge Pietro Orseolo (991-1009). His Chronicle, starting from
the first dawn of Venetian history, extends to the year 1008. It
is to be found ap. Migne, P. L., t. 139; and WZ. G. SS, iii.
The latest edition is by Monticolo, Roma, 1890. Of the first
importance are the letters of St. Boniface (+755). They have
been edited three or four times from the early seventeenth
century edition of Serarius to the beautiful edition of Diimmler,
ap. M. G. Epp., ii., 1892. As supplying us with many facts
with regard to the Iconoclast controversy, the life of St. Stephen,
the younger, by the deacon Stephen is very valuable. Stephen
wrote in 809, forty-two years after the death of his namesake.
His life is printed in the Azalecta Graca, i., of Montfaucon. St.
John Damascene’s ({ ¢ 787) Treatise on Images, of which there
exists an English translation by Miss Allies, (Baker, 1898), is
useful for the theological side of the Iconoclast controversy.

Modern works.—Of the greatest value is Héfelé’s History of the
Councils, vol. v. (Eng. trans.) Doellinger’s essay on Gregory
II., in his Papséfabeln (French trans. by Reinhard, p. 129 f.),
shows the attitude of the Pope to the Greek emperor. On the
policy of Leo, the Isaurian, read Finlay’s Byzantine Empire;
Bury’s History of the Later Roman Empire, i.; and Hodgkin’s
Italy, vi. all very favourably disposed to the Iconoclast
emperors, but thought by many Catholic authors to follow too
closely the prejudiced work of Schlosser, Geschichte der Bilder-
stiirmenden Kaiser.

EMPERORS OF THE KING OF THE EXARCHS OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Anastasius II., 713-715. Liutprand, 712-744. Scholasticus, 713-726.
Theodosius III., 715-716.! Paul, 726-727.
Leo III., 716!-741. Eutychius, 727-752;
apparently the last
of the exarchs.

UNDER any circumstances the J/fe of Gregory II. is
beset with difficulties. But to the Christian historian,
1 The date generally assigned to these events is 717. In giving

716, Héfélé (v. p. 301, Eng. trans.), who was guided by Nicephorus,
has been followed. Nicephorus (Chrom.) gives twenty-five years

ST. GREGORY IL 143

who approaches it with a wish to be impartial, the
biography of that Pontiff presents exceptional difficulties.
The principles—from whatever source drawn, from educa-
tion, natural temperament, and the rest—which he brings
to the examination of the ‘Image-breaking’ (Iconoclast)
heresy, and of the ‘temporal power of the popes,’ are
naturally calculated to make him draw conclusions about
the conduct of St. Gregory in accordance with those
principles. The historian with rationalistic or ‘Puritan’
leanings will, of course, look askance at the great
defender of ‘image-worship. The opponent of govern-
ment by clerics will decry the great Pontiff under whom
the temporal rule of the popes may be said to have
fairly begun.

The difficulties, however, that meet the biographer of
Gregory II., in any case, are caused by the unsatisfactory
nature of some of the records of his time that have come
down to us. We can gather from them little or nothing
of the motzves that actuated the chief figures on the world’s
stage in those times; ¢g., why Leo, after a reign of ten
years, began to persecute the worshippers of images.
There is also a lamentable want of reliable dates in the
period under consideration, and there is much contro-
versy as to the genuineness of some of its most important
documents, ¢g., the two famous letters of the Pope to the
emperor. The Greek historians are so badly informed on
Western affairs as to confuse the two Gregorys; the
Latins relate events which seem scarcely to be consistent.
All this, of course, tells strongly in favour of the prejudiced
writer. He can arrange his facts to suit his theories

three months and fourteen days as the length of the reign of Leo III.
He counts from the time Leo was proclaimed emperor in the camp.
Hence, with Héfélé, we suppose that Leo reigned from March 5, 716,
to June 18, 741.

Similarity
between
the ives

Gregory Il.

Early life

of Gregory.

Ad olen ST. GREGORY II.

with less fear of contradiction. And as the pontificate of
Gregory II. is very important, this is the more unfortunate.
Under the circumstances, then, all that can be done for the
benefit of the reader is to make every effort to lay before
him the sequence of events in the plainest terms, so that he
can judge for himself of the merits of the Ber onas ee that
will be brought under his notice.

At the outset it is interesting to call attention to the
resemblance between the histories of the first two
Gregorys. Both reigned for about the same number of
years, and both were reigning in the beginning of their
respective centuries. Both of noble families, they turned
their parental mansions into monasteries, and both acted
as secretaries of the popes, their immediate predecessors.
Both, in their struggles with the Lombards, subdued them
at last by their personal influence, and both were pre-
pared for their dealings with the emperors of Byzantium
by a personal knowledge of the Eastern court. If, in the
history of the conversion of nations, the name of St.
Augustine and England is inseparably linked with that
of the first Gregory, the second Gregory is just as closely
allied with St. Boniface and Germany. And finally, from
the extracts of his vegzsters! which have come down to
us, it would appear that the second Gregory might also,
like the first, be set down as a careful administrator of
the ‘patrimony of St. Peter.’

To proceed to the details of Gregory’s life. He was,
again like his great namesake, a Roman, the son of
Marcellus and Honesta. It was after her death? that
Gregory, then Pope, transformed the ancestral mansion

1 In the abstracts compiled by Deusdedit, a cardinal of the eleventh
century, and given by Jaffé in his Regesta.

2“Moribus certe Honesta et nomine,” quaintly observes. his
biographer.

ST. GREGORY IL. 145

into a monastery in honour of St. Agatha, zz Sudurra,
endowed it and enriched it with many precious vessels for
the service of the altar. When very young, he was placed
under the care of the popes, and was by Pope Sergius
made subdeacon and treasurer of the Roman See. He
was then entrusted with the care of the papal library}
and made deacon. In the Zzfe of Constantine we saw the
part he played, in the latter capacity, in the affair of
the Quinisext canons with Justinian II.

He was a man of pure life, eloquent and firm, had a Gregory
good knowledge of the sacred Scriptures, and ever showed a
himself a stout upholder of the rights of the Church (ves
ecclestasticé) and a formidable foe to his opponents.? Such
was the man who was consecrated bishop of Rome, May
19, 715. .

Whether or not because he could see that the Lombards, Repairs

2 : the walls
after their long period of rest, were about to make another of Rome.
effort to bring all the Italian peninsula under their yoke, or
because he felt that danger from the Saracens was imminent,®
Gregory, in the very first year of his pontificate, commenced
to repair the walls of Rome, beginning at the gate of St.
Lawrence. But various circumstances (among others,
probably, an unusual rising of the Tiber, about October
716, which did great damage in Rome, lasting for eight
days, and which only subsided after many Litanies had

1 “ Bibliothecee illi est cura commissa.” LZ. P. Gregory is the first
treasurer (sacellarius) and librarian of the Roman See mentioned by
name.

2 “Vir castus, divinee scripturee eruditus, facundus loquela, et
constans animo,” etc. /6. He was known to the Romans as Gregory
the younger, and to the Greeks as ‘ Dialogus’; confusing him with
St. Gregory I., the author of the Dzalogues.

3 One of the correspondents of St. Boniface, writing from Rome
(c. 725), advises that his friend Bugga should not come to Rome,
“donec rebelliones et temptationes et minz Sarracenorum, que
apud Romanos nuper emerserunt, conquieverint.” Ep. 27, 7. G. 4.

VOLS. PT. It. TO

Overflow
of the
Tiber, 716.

146 ST. GREGORY It.

been said by the order of the Pope) prevented Gregory
from completing their entire restoration.1 The last days of
a state have come when it has to depend for its existence
on stone walls! Well was it for Rome in the eighth
century that it had in the person of its bishops a defence
stronger than barred gate or turret!

In connection with the overflow of the Tiber just
mentioned, Duchesne has a very useful topographical
note, which we cannot do better than translate. After
observing that this is the first time that an inundation
caused by the Tiber is described by any of the papal
biographers, he calls attention to the fact that, whenever
an overflow of the Tiber is chronicled by later writers in
the Liber Pontificalzs, it is always in the same words as
those used in this life of Gregory II. Nor is there any
objection to this, as the phenomenon always repeats itself
in the same way. Striking against the north wall of the
city, the river rushed in by the only opening on that side,
viz., the Flaminian Gate. Unable, as it swept along, to
effect an entrance by the openings which lead to the Pons
Aelius (St. Angelo) and the Pons Aurelius (Ponte Sisto),
owing to their height above the river, it nevertheless
managed to force its way through the postern gates and
up the water-courses and other smaller openings. Thence
it spread over the Campus Martius. Along the Via Lata
it rushed to the foot of the Capitol and to the basilica of St.
Mark. Here it had to make a bend; and here it was that
the water seems to have attained its maximum height, and
here was the height of the inundation measured. On the
left bank of the river the flood covered the Neronian fields

11. P.; Paul. De Gest. L., vi. 36; Bede, De sex etat., ad an. 720,
“A Domno itaque Papa letaniz crebro fiebant,” says the Z. P., which
also tells us that the water was over eight feet deep in the Via Lata,
“ad unam et semis staturam.”

ST. GREGORY IL. 147

from the porta St. Petri, near the castle of St. Angelo, to
the Milvian Bridge (Ponte Molle). In the other direction,
viz., towards St. Peter’s, the flood stopped at a place called
Remissa, which is spoken of in the first Ordo Romanus of
Mabillon as a place where the cortege of the Pope halted
for a moment on its way to St. Peter’s on Easter Monday.
As, in the twelfth century, this halt, we know, was made in
front of the steps which led to the atrium of the basilica
(before the church of St. Maria of the Vzrgarz2), z.e., where
now stands the obelisk, it may be argued that there was
the vemzssa of the eighth and ninth centuries.

In this same year (715) also, Gregory received a pro-
fession of faith (a synodical letter) from the ‘ prudent’
John, patriarch of Constantinople, whom we have seen
truckling to the Monothelite emperor Philippicus. This
lengthy letter, of which mention has already been made,
and which had been directed to Constantine, John styled
an apology, inasmuch as it was largely taken up with
specious efforts to palliate his weakness. He had to yield
somewhat, he urged, to the character of the man (viz., the
emperor). After a tedious and confused endeavour to
clear himself as far as possible, John concluded: by assur-
ing the Pope, ‘God-inspired, @edAnwTos, as he called him,
that he is now, on the one hand, in possession of his
defence, and, on the other, of his profession of the orthodox
faith. And he earnestly begs the Pope not to be severe
with him, as he had acted under constraint.

In the eighth century, then, the Pope of Rome, even to
the patriarchs of Constantinople, was the sacred head of the
church (6 tepa xepady), whose office it was to direct and
govern all the other members of the church without excep-
tion, just as, in the human frame, the power of controlling
the other parts of the body proceeds from the head. This
document, so interesting in many ways, may be read in

John,

an t.
Germanus
of Con-
stanti-
nople, 715.

Anglo-
Saxon
pilgrims to
Rome, 716.

148 ST. GREGORY It.

Labbe (Concil., vi. 1407 f.), or in any of the great editions
of the councils. It was one of the documents the deacon
Agatho thought fit to append to the acts of the Sixth
General Council, at which he had been present. Gregory
sent his profession! in return. John probably did not live
to receive it. For on ‘the 11th of August,? Germanus, who
had been bishop of Cyzicus, was transferred to the vacant
patriarchal See of Constantinople, and was installed in the
presence, among others, of “the most holy priest Michael,
apocrisiarius of the Apostolic See.” He was soon, by his
heroism in resisting the tyranny of the Iconoclast Leo, to
atone for his weakness under the Monothelite Philippicus.
The number of Anglo-Saxon pilgrims to Rome, which
throughout the whole of the seventh and eighth centuries
was large, was particularly great during the life of Gregory
Il. “At this time? many of the Angles, noble and simple,
men and women, soldiers and private persons, moved by
the instinct of divine love, were wont to repair from Britain
to’ Rome.” The two most illustrious names among the
English pilgrims of this\ period were those of Abbot
Ceolfrid and: King Ina. Ceolfrid had been the specially
beloved disciple of the great abbot Benedict Biscop, had
accompanied Benedict in his journeys to Rome in search
of books and treasures of all kinds, had been appointed
by him abbot of the monastery of St. Paul, on the north
bank of the Wear, and, after the death of Benedict, had
presided over the twin monasteries of SS. Peter and Paul
for twenty-eight years. Being then very old, he decided to
revisit Rome, “ where he had been in'his youth with Bene-
dict, to the end that, before his death, he might have some

ME Ibs leh

2 Theoph., Chron., ad an. 707.

§ Bede, De sex etat., ad an, 720. Cf. tb., H. Ev. 7. “Quod (te,
Romam ire) his temporibus plures de gente Anglorum, nobiles,
ignobles, laici, clerici, viri ac feminze certatim facere consuerunt.”

ST. GREGORY IL 149

relaxation for a while from the cares of the world”; and that
his brethren might have the benefit of a younger and more
energetic abbot. In tears the monks heard of the deter-
mination of their beloved abbot. And as nothing could
shake the resolve of the aged man, they elected Huethbert
as his successor. In the whole range of monastic history—
one is almost tempted to say in the whole range of general
history—there is nothing more touching than the narrative
of the resignation, departure for Rome, and death of the
abbot Ceolfrid, whether it be read in the simple original
of Venerable Bede,! or in the glowing pages of the historian
of the Monks of the West? Ceolfrid took with him to
Rome.a complete copy of the Bible as a gift to the Church
of St. Peter, and a letter from the new abbot ‘to the
apostolic Pope Gregory, which began as follows: “To the
thrice-blessed Pope Gregory, his most beloved lord in the
Lord of lords, Huethbert, your most humble servant, ....
wishes eternal health in the Lord. I, together with the
brethren, who desire in these places to find rest for their
souls by carrying the easy yoke of Christ, cease not to
render thanks to the providence of the heavenly judge,
that he has. thought fit to appoint you, who are such a
glorious vessel of election, to be the ruler of the Church
Universal in our times; and by means of the light of
truth and faith with which you are filled, to disperse the
beams of his love among your inferiors.”» He proceeds to
recommend to the Pope’s care ‘the venerable grey hairs’
of their dear Ceolfrid.? Such was the language of English
churchmen of the eighth century to the Vicar of Christ.

1 Cf his Lives of the abbots Benedict, Easterwine and Ceolfrid ;
and De sex etat., ad an. 720.

2 Montalembert, iv. 464 f.

3 Bede, Lives of the Abbots of Wearmouth, § 19, Eng. trans.

“Quod te nostris temporibus tam glorificum electionis vas regimini
totius ecclesiz preeficere dignatus est.”

150 ST. GREGORY II.

Ceolfrid was not destined again to see at Rome “the
shrines which it was to him a cause of unceasing joy
to remember and repeat that he had seen and adored in |
his youth.” He died at Langres, September 25, 716.

Ina, the great and powerful king of Wessex, was more
fortunate in accomplishing his pilgrimage. After a glorious
reign of thirty-seven years, he went to Rome (725 or 726),
“being desirous to spend some time of his pilgrimage upon
earth in the neighbourhood of holy places, that he might
be more easily received by the saints into heaven.”?
According to Malmesbury,’ Ina passed his time in Rome
in retirement and in obscurity, clad in the garb of an
ordinary citizen, in order that he might not be seen of men.
Later writers, however, will have it that he spent part of
his time in Rome in founding ‘the school of the English.’
Matthew Paris, who flourished in the first half of the
thirteenth century, tells us* that Ina “built a house in the
city with the consent and goodwill of Pope Gregory, which
he called the school of the English, to which the kings of
England, the royal family, and the clergy might come to
be instructed in the Catholic faith, that nothing false or
contrary to the Catholic faith might be taught in the
Church in England.” In this narrative of Paris there is

1 Bede, Lives of the Abbots of Wearmouth, § 19, Eng. trans., Stevenson.

2 Bede, H. £.,v. 7. Cf. A.-Sax. Chron., ad an. 728, and Lingard,
Hist. of England, i. c. 3.

3 De Gest. Reg., 1. § 37, ed. Migne. “Non publicis vultibus expositus

. amictu plebeio tectus.”

* Ad an. 727. Lingard shows that it can scarcely be maintained
with the same author, that Ina was the first of our kings to establish
the ‘ Romescot,’ or Peter’s Pence ; and thinks that the ‘Rome-feoh,’ as
a national tax, was not imposed before the days of King Alfred. It is
first mentioned by name in the reign of Alfred’s son Edward (Anglo-
Sax. Church, i. 257 seg.). “Ad quam (scholam) reges Anglie....
cum clericis in doctrina et fide catholica erudiendi venirent, ne quid in

Ecclesia Anglicana sinistrum, aut veritati Catholicee contrarium
doceretur” (JZat. Par., ed. Rolls, i. 330).

ST. GREGORY II. I51

nothing intrinsically improbable; nay, considering we find
a schola (colony) of the English certainly established in
Rome in the days of Leo III. (¢816)—(cf ZL. P. in vit.
Leo III., § 372)—it should be even called probably true.
But the distance of time that separates Ina and the monk
makes the statements of the latter about the early history
of our country proportionately open to suspicion.

King Ina was not the only royal personage whom Theodo,
authentic documents enable us to see in Rome in the days ieee
of Pope Gregory. Before the end of the sixth century ie es
there seem to have been Christian dukes in Bavaria, but
it was only during the seventh century apparently that
Christianity was to any considerable extent propagated
among the Bavarians. Its true apostle, St. Emmeran, had
been slain in the middle of that century; and in the
beginning of the eighth century its Duke Theodo, called II.
by some and I. by others, came to Rome, ‘the first of his
race,’ to pray (oratzonis voto).1 He doubtless also came to
arrange with Gregory about taking further measures for
the complete conversion of his country. For in the May
of this same year (716) Gregory addressed a series of
instructions to Bishop Martinian, and to Gregory and
Dorotheus, deacon and subdeacon of the Apostolic See,
when setting out for Bavaria. He bade them, in con-
junction with the duke, establish ecclesiastical discipline;
and, after careful instruction of the candidates, to constitute
a hierarchy. If, however, they cannot find a proper person
to set over the new episcopate as archbishop, they are to
send word to him (Gregory), and he will send a suitable
one.2 He gave minute directions as to what they were

1 L, P.; Paulus Diac., De Gest. Langob., vi. 44.

2 Ap. Mansi, xii. 257 ; Fleury, ix.157. “Si certe talem non invenire
poteritis, hoc aut per vos, aut per vestras litteras innotescatis ; quatenus
de hac sacra sede przevidentes, utilem cum Dei auxilio dirigamus.”

St. Cor-
binian.

152 ST. GREGORY II.

to teach concerning marriage, a matter undoubtedly of as
much importance in civilising and christianising a wild
and pagan people as in preserving a civilisation already
acquired. The man who tampers with the sacred truths
in connection with marriage is aiming destructive blows
at the very key-stone of civilisation. As very important
points to be attended to in the conversion of idolaters, the
Pope exhorted the missionaries to warn the people against
the observance of dreams, and of lucky and unlucky days,
and against incantations and witchcraft. The necessity of
personal penance for sin, the resurrection of the body and
the eternity of hell, were also among the striking truths
that the Pope would have impressed on the minds of the
heathen Bavarians.

To revert for a moment to Theodo, the convert of
St. Rupert (¢718). He seems to have died (716 or 717)
soon after his visit to Rome, before the death of his
spiritual father, and before the return to Bavaria of the
saint now to be spoken of.

To help to hasten on the conversion of Bavaria, Gregory
induced St. Corbinian, a Frank, like most of the other
missionaries who converted the Bavarians, whom his
predecessor had ordained bishop, not to retire from the
world, as the worthy bishop wished to do, but to return
and continue his labours in the Lord’s vineyard. The
chronology of the life of St. Corbinian is a little obscure,
owing toa mistake (in c. 2). of his biographer Aribo,! his
third successor (764-784) in the See of Freisingen, who has
either confused Pepin ‘of Heristal’ with Charles Martel or
Constantine with Gregory IT.

If, however, with the Bollandists we suppose that Aribo,
who as a boy may have seen Corbinian, by an easy lapse
of memory assigned the two visits of the saint to Rome

1 Ap. Acta SS., Sept. 8.

ST. GREGORY II. 153

to the reign of the same Pope (Gregory II.), the narrative
of Aribo will be consistent, not only with itself but with
other historical data. Though a man of strong feeling,
not to say temper—indeed, no doubt on that very account
—it is plain that Corbinian exerted a great influence on all
with whom he came into contact. Wherever he went he
soon became very popular, and was everywhere sought
after. Fearing that his popularity would prove a snare to
his virtue, he left his native place (near Melun, not far from
Paris), and went to Rome with a number of disciples, not
only to seek the Pope’s instruction and prayers,! but also
that he might obtain a quiet spot, where, away from the
praise and flattery of men, he could live under monastic
rule. This was probably in 709, when Constantine was
Pope. But it was not difficult to conclude that a man with
such spirit as. Corbinian, and with such a winning person-
ality, was a proper subject for the performance of great
things. Constantine would not allow him to hide his light
under a bushel. He consecrated him bishop, and gave him
the pallium, which, though usually the sign of archiepiscopal
jurisdiction, was, as we have seen, occasionally bestowed on
bishops. To Frankland accordingly Corbinian returned,
to work with the power of a successor of the apostles.
Again was the homage of men at his feet, and again did
he seek to shun. its dangerous allurements by retiring to a
cell. His retreat was discovered, and once more did men
flock around him; and once. more had he recourse to
Rome, hoping that what one Pope had refused another
might grant. No doubt to avoid embarrassing recogni-
tion, he did: not go through Gaul but through Germany.
Whilst he was journeying through Bavaria (717), it in
some way came to the ears of Theodo;-who had by that

1 “Ft ibi (at Rome) se Apostolici (the Pope) doctrinze et orationibus
commendare,” c. 2.

154 ST. GREGORY II.

time returned from Rome, that the saintly Corbinian was
on his way to the Eternal City. He invited him to come
to him.1 Especially eager was the duke’s son, Grimwald,
that he should abide with them. But to escape from the
turmoil of the world was the deep desire of Corbinian. He
continued his journey to Rome ‘to obtain his release’—
solutionem percipere.

Gregory II., however, proved no more amenable than
his predecessor. Still, with a view of making a deeper im-
pression on the saint, he examined the affair in a synod.
All were of opinion that he should return to the Lord’s
vineyard. Not to be disobedient, Corbinian submitted,
and again turned his face towards the North. He was not
destined to reach the land of the Franks, Grimwald had
resolved that if the saint had to return to the world,
he should remain to labour in Bavaria. This, perforce,
Corbinian had to do. Grimwald, however, had soon reason
to regret his pious violence. He had married his brother’s
widow, the beautiful Piltrudis. Corbinian, who had now
fixed his See at Freisingen in Upper Bavaria, denounced
the marriage; and after a long struggle succeeded in
bringing about a separation between the pair. But Pil-
trudis returned to Grimwald. and to influence. Corbinian
was banished. The misdeeds of the guilty couple were
destined to be punished even in this life. To ensure a
more real dependence of the Bavarians on the Frankish
kingdom, Charles Martel invaded Bavaria both in 725
and 729. Grimwald lost his life (725 or 729) and
Piltrudis her liberty. She was carried into Frankland
by Charles, and seems to have died in poverty.
The Bavarian dukedom passed to Hucbert, Grim-
wald’s nephew. He recalled Corbinian, who died work-

1 “Qui dum virum Dei Corbinianum ibidem advenisse cognovit ad
se invitavit,” c. 3.

ST. GREGORY II. _» aes

ing for the conversion of the Bavarians, probably
in 730.

But the one who firmly established the faith in Bavaria, St. Boni-
as in the whole of Germany, was St. Boniface, or Winfrid, (Wintria).
which was his proper name. This glorious apostle of
Germany was one of our own countrymen, having been
born at Crediton, in Devonshire,? about 680. This is not
the place to treat at length of the heroic labours of St.
Boniface for the conversion® of the Germans. We must.
be content to unfold his relations with the popes.

Fired with zeal for the conversion of nations, Winfrid, First
journey

who had become a monk, betook himself to Rome (718) ; toRome
and, as the abbess of Minster expressed* it to Boniface
himself, God “moved the pontiff of the glorious See to
grant the desire of your heart.” With all the ardour of
his soul, Winfrid poured forth to the Pope the cause of
his coming to him, and told him® with what a longing
desire he had wished to preach the Gospel to the

1 Cf. Hist. de Péglise de France, by Jager, iil. pp. 459-464; De
Saucliéres, Aizst. des Conc., iii. p. 164; Butler’s Lives of the Saints,
Sept. 8; especially Acta SS., Sept. IL.

2 The life of St. Boniface was written by the priest Willibald—not
a bishop nor a disciple of St. Boniface, as Jaffé shows—in 768, thirteen
years after the death of the saint. This life has been published by
various editors, ¢.g., Serarius, in 1605, at the end of his edition of the
saint’s letters; by Pertz, on. Germ. Hist. SS., ii.; and by Jaffé
(Berlin, 1866). Cf. also the life by the monk Otholo (?), who wrote in the
second half of the eleventh century. In 735 Boniface called himself
‘decrepit, Ep. 34.

3 Cf Butler’s Lzves of the Saints, June 5 ; Lingard’s Anglo-Saxon
Church, ii. c. 14; Mrs. Hope’s Conversion of the Teutonic Race, vol.
il. : ‘ Germans,

4 Ap. M. G. Epp,, iii. p. 264.

5 The details of this interview we have from Willibald, c. 5, p. 26
of Jaffé’s edition : “ Omnemque sibi (Gregorio) per ordinem itineris sui
atque adventus occasionem manifestavit, et, quali ancxius desiderio
diutius desudasset, aperuit. Sanctus itaque papa, repente hilari vultu
adridentbusque oculis intuitus in eum, inquisivit, an letteras ab
episcopo suo commendaticias detulisset,” etc.

156 ST, GREGORY II.

heathens. Delighted with the saint’s vivacity, the Pope
could not forbear to smile at the earnestness of the
zealous Englishman at his feet; but to be sure that the
zeal came from true virtue, and was according to order,
Gregory asked him if he had commendatory letters
from his bishop. At the word the letters were at once
produced. From them, the idea which Gregory had con-
ceived of Boniface was confirmed, and daily, conferences

' were held between them. At length (May 15, 719), with

The Chris-
tianity that
Boniface
found in
Germany.

the Pope’s blessing and with letters from him, Boniface was
“sent to the wild nations of Germany to see whether the
rude soil of their hearts, when tilled by the ploughshare
of the Gospel, would receive the seed of truth.”? In the
letter of authorisation to preach in Germany, which Gregory
addressed 2 to Boniface, the Pope approves of his desire, as
well on account of his earnest zeal and knowledge of the
Holy Scriptures as because he had proceeded in the proper
order, viz.,as a member of a body, and had put himself in
communication with the head. “And so,” continues? the
Pope, “in the name of the undivided Trinity, and by the
irrefragable authority of Blessed Peter, the Prince of the
Apostles, whose place we hold, go forth and preach to the
nations in the bonds of error the truths of both testaments.”

Before the coming of St. Boniface, Christianity, as we
have seen, had been preached in Germany, but in a

1 Willibald, c. 5, p. 26 of Jaffé’s edition.

2 Ap. Mansi, xii.. and Ep. 118, ap. Epp. Bonif., ed. Serarius ; Ep.
12, @.G.H. This letter is addressed to ‘ Boniface,’ the priest, and
is dated the Ides of May, 2nd Indiction (viz., May 15, 719). Note
that Winfrid had already assumed the Latin name of Boniface.

3 “Tdeo in nomine indivisibilis Trinitatis, per inconcussam auctori-
tatem B. Petri App. principis, cujus doctrine magisteriis dispensatione

fungimur . .. . precipimus .... ad gentes quascunque infideli-
tatis errore detentas properare , ... potueris,.... et per spiritum
virtutis ... . preedicationem utriusque testamenti mentibus indoctis

consona ratione transfundas.” Jé.

ST. GREGORY IL 157

tore or less desultory kind of way. Owing, however,
to the isolation and smallness of the Christian communi-
ties, little advancement was being made. In fact, in
many instances, they were themselves eaten up with
errors and superstitions. After having purified its various
parts, Boniface put the Church in Germany on a firm
basis, by welding the different communities together and
joining them with the centre of Christian life, the See of
Rome. Justly did he earn for himself the admiration of
the Christian Europe of his day, the everlasting gratitude
of the German people from that time forth, the title of
Apostle of Germany, and the martyr’s crown!

Boniface, following out the papal instructions, began
his labours in Thuringia. There, and in Hesse and
Saxony, he laboured unremittingly in restoring discipline
and in purifying and spreading the faith. After many
thousand pagans had embraced? the doctrines of Christ,
Boniface sent (722) one Bynnan to Rome to tell the
Pope what had been done, and to ask a variety of
questions as to the direction of the infant Church. The
Pope replied by summoning Boniface to Rome. In
company with a number of his brethren, Boniface at
once set out for Rome in the autumn of 722. From
Willibald we learn that the sight of the Eternal City
deeply moved him, as it must move every true Christian.
“As soon® as he caught sight of the walls of Rome, he
poured forth praise to God; and when he reached St.
Peter’s he armed himself with prayer.” The Pope met

1“Jn Thyringeam, juxta mandatum apostolice sedis
progressus est.” Vita Willib., c. 5.
2 “Multisque milibus hominum . . . . baptizatis, idoneum nuntium
. nomine Bynnan Romam direxit.” /0., c. 6.
3 “Et Romanze urbis moenibus conspectis, Altithrono repente
condignas gratiarum laudes rependit, et ad B. Petri mox secclesiam
perveniens, diligenti se oratione munivit.” 1d.

158 ST. GREGORY IL.

the saint in St. Peter’s; and, after mutual greetings, at
once proceeded to question him with regard to the faith
he had been teaching. Perhaps some wicked persons,
from jealousy or other motives, had been casting asper-
sions on the doctrinal preaching of Boniface. “ Apostolic
father,” answered Boniface, “as a foreigner I find it hard
to understand your speech; give me but time, and I will
set forth my faith in writing.” Readily, of course, was the
delay granted. It is interesting to observe from this passage
that the pure Latinity affected by St. Gregory the Great
had in a hundred years so changed in the mouth of his
illustrious namesake, that to a stranger it was not easy to
follow its altered form. Some days after his profession
of faith had been handed in to the Pope, Boniface, called
to the Lateran, received it back from Gregory, with
an exhortation ever to stand by it himself, and with all
his strength to preach it to others. Then on November
30, 722, Gregory consecrated Boniface bishop? In
accordance with the general custom of the bishops
ordained at Rome, Boniface, with his own hand, wrote
out a profession of faith, which he swore to follow, and
placed it on the tomb of St. Peter. The oath which
Boniface took was much the same as that taken by the
bishops of Italy, and had been in use as far back as
the pontificate of Gelasius I. (492-496). It is given4

’ “Domine apostolice, novi me imperitum, jam peregrinus, vestra
familiaritatis sermone ; sed queso, ut otium mihi tempus conscribendze
fidei concedas, et muta tantum littera meam fidem adaperiat.” Vita
Willib., c. 6.

* 1b. The true date may be 723.

3 See the Liber diurnus Rom. Pont., F. 75, ed. Sickel. Reprinted
in the 17. G. H. Epp,, iii. 265. In the oath, as taken by Boniface,
there is no mention of loyalty to the empire.

4 See it also quoted in Lingard, A.-Sax. Church, Note T, vol. ii.
Alzog, Universal Church Hist, ii. p. 84, etc. Cf also S¢z. anes
and the Conversion of Germany, by Mrs. Hope, p. 79.

ST. GREGORY It. 19

towards the beginning of Otholo’s life of our saint, and
runs as follows: “In the name of Our Lord God and
Saviour Jesus Christ, in the sixth year after the consul-
ship of the emperor Leo, and in the fourth year of the
emperor Constantine his son, in the sixth Indiction :—

“JT, Boniface, by the grace of God, bishop, promise to
thee, Blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, and to thy
Vicar, the Blessed Pope Gregory and his successors, by
the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, undivided Trinity, and
by thy most holy body, to proclaim the whole Catholic
faith in all its purity ; and by the help of God, to remain
steadfast in the unity of that faith, in which, without doubt,
is the Christian’s hope of salvation. Never, at the bidding
of anyone, will I do anything against the unity of the
One Universal Church; but, as I have said, I will in
all things be faithful and helpful to thee and to the
interests of thy Church (to which God has given the
power of binding and loosing), and thy said Vicar and
his successors.

“ Moreover, I will hold no communion with any bishops
who may contemn the canons, but, if I can, will. prevent
them from so doing ; and, if I cannot, will denounce them
to the Holy See.

“And if, which God forbid, I should at any time or
in any way act against this oath of mine, may I be
found guilty at the last judgment and incur the penalty
of Ananias and Saphira, who dared to speak a lie to
you.

“This oath, I, Boniface, a lowly bishop, have written out
with my own hand; and, according to what is prescribed,
have placed it on the most holy body of Blessed Peter,
and, in the sight of God, have sworn to keep it.”

Gregory did not detain Boniface in Rome long after
his consecration (November 30, 622), but sent him back

160 ST. ‘GREGORY ‘II.

again to the field of his toils with a book of the canons,
a letter of recommendation to Charles Martel ; a synodal?
letter—so called because read at the synod held for the
installation of the new bishop—addressed to the clergy
and. people; ‘a letter? to all the clergy, the ‘glorious
Dukes, the “magnificent Castellans, Counts, and to all
God-fearing Christians”; and two others to the Thur-
ingians and to the Alt or Old Saxons in particular.

The powerful Mayor of the palace received our saint
with the greatest reverence (723); took him under his
protection; and in a letters in which he styles himself
‘illustrious’ and ‘Majordomo, and which he addressed
to his “ Lords and Fathers in Christ the Bishops, to Dukes,
Counts, Vicars, Domestics, Stewards, to his Juniors, to
the (royal) I7zssz and to his friends,’ Charles informs them
all that Boniface has been placed under his ‘ Mundbyrd,’®
that is, under his special protection. With the strength of
Charles Martel to help him, Boniface resumed his labours
in Hesse and Thuringia; and, as it were by magic,

1 “ Fique libellum, in quo sacratissima ecclesiasticee constitutionis jura
pontificalibus sunt digesta conventibus, accommodavit.” Willib., c. 6;
Ep. to Charles, 17. G. Z., 20.

2 Ap. Mansi, xii.; 47. G. H, 18. It is practically the same as the
“synodal’ in use in the time of Pope Gelasius, as may be seen by
comparing it with the ‘synodal’ in the Lzber Diurnus.

3 Ap. Mansi, xii. ; 12. G. H., 17. “Greg. Ep. Servus servorum Dei,
universis reverendissimis sacratissimis fratribus coepiscopis,... .
gloriosis Ducibus, magnificis Castaldiis, Comitibus,” etc. These letters
are dated Dec. 1, 722 (or 723?). To all the Thuringians, S. 1109,
M. G. H., 19 ; to the Saxons, S. 121, 17. G. A, 21.

Dy GE Sy ee WE (EX Ve by ey

6 “Fecimus ei (Bonifacio) manum nostram roboratam dare, ut
ubicumque, ubi et ubi ambulare videtur, cum nostro amore, vel sub
nostro mundeburdio et defensione quietus vel conservatus esse debeat.”
Ep. Caroli; or ep. 22, 14.G. H. ‘Mundeburdium’ or ‘ mundeburgium’
is a German word, from an obsolete ‘munder,’ meaning a memoir, and
biirge, bail or security. See a formula of a ‘charter of Munderburde,’
ap. Marculf, Hormule, 1. 24, ed. Migne, P. L., t. 87, p. 714.

ST. GREGORY IL. 161

churches, monasteries and episcopal Sees sprang up in
all directions.1

Informed by the letters of Boniface of what was being
effected in Germany in the way of conversion by his ex-
ertions, Gregory wrote? to congratulate him on his success
(December 4, 724); but, to keep him humble, did not fail
to remind him that it was God who gives the increase, and
that he must persevere in the good he was doing if he
hoped to gain the immortal crown of victory. But Gregory
did not content himself with a mere verbal interest in the
work of Boniface. He showed his practical concern in
the endeavours of our saint, not merely by writing? to
the Thuringians to urge them to renounce their idolatry
and to receive Boniface, whom “we have sent to you to
baptize you... . not for any temporal gain, but for the
good of your souls”; but also by trying to procure the
active interference of Charles Martel in his favour. A
certain bishop, anxious to reap where he had not sown,
claimed part of the newly-converted province as belonging
to his diocese. Concerning this bishop, writes* Gregory to
Boniface, “we have written paternal letters to our most
excellent son and patrician Charles, begging him to
restrain the said bishop, and we have little doubt that
the matter will be attended to.”

The last communication that the Pope had with Boni-
face was towards the close of 726. Boniface had sent

1 “Cui (Bonifacio) Deus tantam in omni Germania potestatem
contulit, ut, quovis vellet, ecclesias ccenobiaque fundaret, sedes
episcopales statueret parrochiasque earum divideret.” Otholo, vit. in
preefat.

2 E-p125, 6009015124, 2. ed:

3 Ep. 120, ed. .S.; M@.G. H. Epp.,25. “Bonifacium ad vos direximus,
ut vos debeat baptizare .... non pro lucro aliquo temporali con-
quirendo, sed pro lucro animarum vestrarum.” This letter also belongs
to the year 724.

4 Ep. 24, 7. G. #7.
VOL, I. Pr..i1, II

Minor
events.

JEé2 ST. GREGORY IL

to ask the Pope for solutions to various difficulties that
had sprung up in the course of his administering the
young Church, just as St. Augustine consulted St.
Gregory I. To these questions Gregory returned * (Nov-
ember 22, 726) suitable answers, “not from us as of
ourselves, but by the grace of Him who opens the mouth
of the dumb and makes ‘the tongues of infants eloquent’”
(Wisd, x. 21). Some of the questions related to marriage,
others to the question of re-baptism, and others to con-
tagious diseases. The replies of the Pope (ex apostolice
sedis vigore) were in accordance with canon law or sound
practical sense, as the case might be. His letter concludes
with the prayer that’ “He who, by apostolic authority,
has caused you to go into those countries in our stead,
may help you to obtain the reward of your labours and
us to get the pardon of our sins.” The rest of the career
of St. Boniface, his reception of the pallium, his third
journey to Rome, his reforms in Gaul, and his martyrdom
(June 5, 755), belong to the times of St. Gregory III,
Zachary and Stephen III., and will be treated of in the
lives of those popes.

Before proceeding with the most important events of
Gregory’s reign, viz., his relations with the Lombards
and the Iconoclast emperors, relations, it may be observed,
very much interconnected, the remaining minor events
of his pontificate may be conveniently noticed here.

From the lists of church repairs and decorations ordered
by Gregory, left us by his biographer, we may safely
conclude he was a lover of the glory of God’s House.
A still extant inscription between the doors which lead

1 Ep. 26, ed. W@.G. H. “Consulenti tibi de statu Ecclesiz non ex
nobis, quasi ex nobis, sed ejus gratia, qui aperit os mutum et ‘linguas

infantium facit disertas, qualiter tenere debeas, Apostolici vigoris
doctrina edicimus.”

ST. GREGORY II. 163

from the vestibule into the interior of St. Peter’s records

the donation by Gregory of certain lands and olive groves

to SS. Peter and Paul, to provide the lamps of the
basilica with oil—pro concinnatione luminariorum vestrorum,

as it was expressed. He founded monasteries round the

great basilica of St. Paul, outside the walls, that there
might be monks to recite therein the Divine Office by

day and by night. His action with regard to his ancestral
mansion, and his founding or restoring various other
monasteries,| show him also as a lover of the monastic
order. Among the monasteries restored by Gregory II. Restores
was the famous monastery on Monte Cassino, one of the Cassino,’
highest hills in its neighbourhood, and which overlooks BE
the city of San Germano. About the year 580 the
original abbey had been destroyed by the Lombards,

The monks had fled to Rome, where, under Pope Pelagius

II., they had founded the Lateran monastery. Some-

time about the year 717, as is generally supposed, a
citizen of Brescia, one Petronax, “full of the fire of divine
love,” came to Rome; and, at the exhortation of Pope
Gregory, betook himself to Monte Cassino, and became

the second founder of the glorious abbey of that name.

He was helped in his work as well by some hermits,
whom he found on the mountain, as by some monks of

the Lateran congregation, assigned to him by the Pope.

With Petronax, therefore, Gregory shares the honour of
being the second of the four founders of the world-
renowned monastery of Monte Cassino.

Among the great monasteries of Italy which were St.Vineent s
rebuilt or founded during the eighth century was the Volturno.
famous one of St. Vincent’s on the river Volturno. It
was founded by three young noblemen of Benevento
during the reign of Gregory, and was first governed

eS: Se OY ap 2 Paul. Diac., vi. 40; Leo Ost., Chrovz., i. 4.

The Pope
and the
Saracens.

164 ST. GREGORY II.

by its three founders in ‘succession. On the death of the
first abbot (720), the second of the three noblemen, Taso
by name, a cousin of the first, was chosen abbot. The
choice was in some respects unfortunate, as the zeal and
sanctity of Taso were wanting in discretion, probably
on account of his youth, as he was the youngest of
the three. He would have placed upon the monks
burdens greater than they could bear. The consequence
was that Taso was deposed, and his elder brother Tato
was elected abbot in his stead. An appeal to Rome was
the consequence. Gregory, of course, condemned the
conduct of the rebellious monks, and inflicted a severe
penance upon them—apparently some hard manual labour.
For we are told that the heat rendered the penance
very difficult of accomplishment. Autpert (fc 778), a
monk, and afterwards abbot of this same monastery, who
tells us! this incident, adds that God also punished the
disobedient monks. They soon all died, and were shortly
afterwards followed to the grave by the abbot himself.
Autpert tells us that he wrote down this sequel to the
affair, that “for the future both shepherd and flock might
refrain from such disturbing conduct.”

. A very curious story is to be found in the Liber
Pontificats in connection with the Saracens in Spain,
which serves at least to show that Gregory was watching
with an anxious eye over the temporal as well as the
spiritual welfare of his flock, and that consequently he
was doing all he could to encourage the leaders of the
Franks in their efforts against the Moslems, who for the
second time had just besieged Constantinople itself. In
the year 711 the Mohammedans poured into Spain, and
in ten years not only overthrew the Visigothic kingdom in
what is now called Spain, but were contesting (721) that

1 Vita Paldonis, Tasonis, etc., c. 12, 13, ap. 7. G. SS, Langod.

ST. GREGORY II. 165

part of it which had once extended over southern France.
Unfortunately, whether in ancient or modern authors, it
is not easy to determine the exact order of events in this
invasion of the Moslems. However, it seems clear that
beneath the walls of Toulouse, Eudo, Duke of Aquitaine,
gained a victory over them (721)? by his own unaided
efforts, eleven years before Charles Martel, with the aid
of Eudo, for ever did away with danger from them to
France in the decisive battle of Poitiers (732). According
to the Book of the Popes, Gregory had sent ‘three blessed
sponges’? to the Frankish leader in the preceding year
(720). Of these Eudo gave small particles to his troops to
be eaten just before the battle. We are assured that of
those who eat of the blessed sponge, not one was slain
or wounded! The use of ‘sponges’ in this connection
seems so extraordinary, that it has been contended, eg., by
Jager,* that the Pope sent indeed some ezlogza, 2.e., blessed

1 Cf. Paul. Diac., 7 L., vi. 46; LZ. P., and the French and Spanish
authorities cited by Dunford in his A/7zst. of Spain, i. p. 229; Fleury,
ix. 225; AZst. of France, by Kitchin, i. 105. According to the Annales
Veteres Franc. (Migne, P. L., t. 98), ad an. 715, it was in 720 that the
Saracens began to besiege Toulouse : “Post 1X anno quam in Spania
ingressi sunt Saraceni.”

2 “Bjecit Heudo Saracenos de Aquitania” is the entry for the year
721 in the “Ann. Lauresh., Almanici, and Nazariani,” ap. Pertz,
M Gully 4.

3 Comparing different versions of the Lzber Pont., and the facts
therein contained, it would seem that the victory here spoken of by
Anastasius, and by him referred to the reign of this Pope, really refers,
in part at least, to the victory of Charles Martel at Poitiers, and
should be assigned to the reign of Gregory III. (732) ; he has, therefore,
to say the least, confused the two battles; and so what he quotes
from a letter of Eudo to the Pope (viz., the number of Saracens slain,
375,000) should be referred to Gregory III.’s reign.

4 Hist. de Péglise de France, iii. 489, 60. One of the versions of
the passage in the Z. P. reads: “Facta est autem Francorum
generalis motio contra eos (Saracenos), et .... interemerunt uno
die ex eis ccclxxv millia; ex Francorum vero parte mille tantum
quingenti interierunt, ut Francorum missa Pontifici epistola con-

Synod in
Rome,
April 5,
721.

Gregory
makes
peace
between
the patri-
archs of
Grado and
Aquileia,
723.

166 ST. GREGORY II.

bread or some other blessed present; but that for
‘sponges’ (spongi@) should be read sportule or baskets.
So that the passage would indicate that “three baskets of
blessed bread, such as used at the Pope’s table,” were sent
to Eudo. Such an alteration of the text, however, is at
once arbitrary and unnecessary. In days when people eat
their food with their fingers, sponges would be a useful
adjunct to the dinner table. And, likely enough, they
were not so common among the Franks in the eighth
century that they might not well serve as fitting objects
for a Pope to send as a present—the more so that, then
as now, Catholics value a present from the Pope because
it has come from his anointed hands, and not so much
because of its intrinsic worth. Gregory no doubt sent
the three sponges for lavatory purposes! The use they
were actually put to by Eudo was due to the lively faith of
that warrior. The passage is chiefly important, however, as
we have said already, inasmuch as it shows that Gregory
was carefully watching the movements of the Saracens, and
was kept informed as to what was being done against them.

But political affairs, great and important though they
were, did not take up the whole of Gregory’s attention. In
the April of 721 a synod at Rome under his guidance drew
up! seventeen canons for the furtherance of discipline.
These canons had reference mostly to the Sacrament of
matrimony, and forbade marriage with those consecrated
to God, or between near relatives.

Gregory’s next occupation was that of peacemaker.

The ‘schism of Aquileia’ was at least fruitful in one
respect. It engendered ¢wo patriarchs? As might be

tinebat. Qui Pontifex anno praemisso in benedictionem eis direxerat
tres spongias,” etc.

1 Mansi, xii. ; Héfélé, Hist. of the Councils, v. p. 256, Eng. trans,

2 Cf. supra, 95, and Pt. I., 317.

ST. GREGORY IL 167

expected, two men with very large powers, but with a
limited area to exercise them in, did not always agree as
to how much of the said area was the peculiar sphere of
action of each of them. The patriarch of Aquileia, at this
time, was Serenus, Bishop of Forum Julii (Cividale), whose
rights were limited to the mainland of Venetia, to that part
where reached the power of the Lombards. In response to a
request preferred by Liutprand, Gregory sent the pallium
to Serenus. Elated at this, Serenus began to encroach on
the rights of Grado. Donatus, the patriarch of Grado,
appealed to Gregory for protection. Gregory at once
wrote 2 to Serenus (December I, 723), reminding him that
humility was the noblest ornament of high station, and
that he (the Pope) had sent him the pallium on the under-
standing that he would not attempt to interfere with what
was due to others. By right of his apostolical authority
he warned the patriarch not to transgress the rights of
others, but to be content with his own, otherwise he would
feel the weight of apostolical rigour.

On the other hand, Gregory wrote® to Donatus, the
patriarch of Grado, ze., the patriarch of Aquileia resident
in Grado, to his suffragans, to Marcellus the Doge, and to
the people of Venetia and Istria. To judge from the Pope’s
letter, Donatus had objected to the Pope’s granting the
pallium to Serenus at all. For the Pope opens his letter
by reminding Donatus,‘ that in virtue of the office, which

1 Cf. Dandolo in Chron., ap. Muratori, Rk. 1. S., Sar OE, SasIONs and
John the Deacon, Chronicon Gradense, ap. Pertz, M@. G. SS., vil.
46; or M. G. SS. Langob., c. 8, 9.

2 “x auctoritate apostolica praecipimus, ne ullo modo terminos ab
eo possessos accedas, sed de his habeto quze modo usque possedisti ;
nec amplius quam in finibus gentis Longobardorum existentibus gressum
tendere preesumas.” Ep. 15, Greg.; or MZ. G. SS. Langob., p. 395:

3 7b. Ep. 16, Greg.

4 Ep. 16. “Ex ministerio, quod ex miseratione divina gerimus,
H ; 3 : 42)
quicquid provide deliberatum peragere, absgue obstaculo, convent,

The
Bishop of
Pola
usurps the
See of
Grado, 725.

168 ST. GREGORY IL

by the divine mercy he holds, it is his to carry through—
all obstacles to the contrary notwithstanding—whatever
he has, after careful consideration, judged to be right.
However, continues Gregory, he has no wish to act in
that high-handed manner; and he informs Donatus of
the line of conduct. he has adopted towards Serenus. In
conclusion he warns them all to look to it, that the
Lombards do not take advantage of any dissension among
them to make an attempt upon their country. The
patriotism of the man is apparent everywhere.

On the death of Donatus, Peter, Bishop of Pola, was
translated to, or usurped, the See of Grado. Translation
from see to see, however, was not of old in accordance
with the discipline of the Church; and Pope Gregory at
once declared Peter deprived of both Pola and Grado.
The people of Venetia, at whose invitation, doubtless, Peter
had left his See of Pola, begged the Pope to have mercy.
Gregory, therefore, allowed Peter to return to his original
See; but by letter warned the people of Venetia only to
elect their bishops in accordance with the laws of God and
the Church.1 At the bidding of this same Gregory II., not
of Gregory III., as the date of this letter proves, Antoninus”
was elected patriarch of Grado. Space enough has now
been given to what may be regarded as the minor events
of Gregory’s reign. Our attention must now be given to
the Pope’s dealings with the Lombards and the Iconoclast
Emperor Leo, the Isaurian—dealings which occupied
almost the whole reign of Gregory.

1 Cf. Dandolo in Chron. The letter (dated March 1, 725) is given in
M. G. Epp, iii., along with the two preceding ones.

2 Cf. Chron. Pat. Grad. “Qui (Greg. III., says the Chronicle, but it
should be Greg. II.) post obitum Donati Gradensis patriarche
epistolam suam direxit universis Venetiensis seu Histrie et cuncto
populo, ut electionem in Gradensem patriarcham facerent; qui
precepto ejusdem p. Gregorii elegerunt Antoninum.”

ST, GREGORY IL 169

There seems to have been a fairly good understanding Liutprand
between the Lombards and Gregory in the early days of (mums
his pontificate. As Dr. Hodgkin takes notice Liutprand Gn of ie
was swayed in the drawing up of his laws by the letters of “PS 71°
the Pope, “ who is the head of the Churches of God, and of
the priests in the whole world.” And at the exhortation of
Gregory he abandoned his designs on the patrimony of the
‘Cottian Alps, and confirmed the restitution of it which
had been made by Aripert II. When trouble with the
Lombards did begin, it was not with their king, but
with one of the practically independent Lombard dukes,
Romwald II. It was to render these dukes more sub-
missive that, as will be noted presently, there took place
such an extraordinary alliance as that between an exarch
and a king of the Lombards.

By stratagem, and at a time when there was? peace The Lom-
between the Lombards and the empire, the Lombards of areca
the Duchy of Benevento got possession (717) of Cuma, a 7*”*
town that belonged to the Duchy of Naples. In Rome
all was sadness at this untoward event, as their communica-
tions with Naples were now cut off. But the loyalty and
patriotism of Gregory were equal to the occasion. Though,
ever since the recall of Narses, the ‘Roman’ emperors at
Constantinople were only theoretically the rulers of any
part of Italy at any distance from the walls of Ravenna,
still, despite the outrageous treatment the popes received
at their worthless hands, they (the popes) remained faith-

1 Jtaly, vi. pp. 394-440. “Papa urbis Rome, qui in omni mundo
toto caput ecclesiarum Dei et sacerdotum est.” Liut., Legum, |. v. c. 4,
AD tie Leia £1. te

2 Cf. Bede, De sex etat. ad ann. 708 and 719; ZL. P. in vit.
Joan. VII. and Greg. II. Paul. Diac., De Gest. L., vi. 28 and vi. 43,
where he says: “ Eo tempore Luitprandus Rex, donationem Patrimonii
Alpium Cottiarum Romanz Ecclesiz confirmavit.” Cf. sup., p. 111 /-

3 “ Cumanum castrum ipso fuerat tempore a Longobardis pacis dolo
pervasum,” L.P. Cf Gesta Epp. Neap., c. 36.

170 ST. GREGORY IL

ful to the emperors as long as it was at all possible. And
so, on the present occasion, filled with grief at what had
happened, Gregory used every means to induce the
Lombards to give up their ill-gotten gains. He threatened
them with the divine vengeance for their perfidy; he
offered them money. But the Lombards despised the
Pope’s threats and his money alike. Failing in this direc-
tion, Gregory, by daily letters, did his best to rouse the
Duke of Naples into action, telling him what ought? to be
done, and promising to reward him if he were successful.
With Theodimus, a subdeacon, one of the ‘rectors’ of the
patrimony? at his back, the Duke John managed in his
turn to take Cumz by surprise, killed or captured the
Lombard garrison, and. for further reward received from
the truly patriotic Pope no less an amount than 703
Ibs. of gold, or about 43000, a very considerable sum in
those days. The apparently conflicting action of the
Lombards at this period may be best harmonised by
reflecting that ambitious and able sovereigns seem to have
the power of summoning similar spirits around them;
that it was Liutprand’s aim to make all Italy, in fact as
well as in name, dependent on him ; and that consequently

1“Ducatum eis qualiter agerent quotidie scribendo presentabat.”
L. P. Cf. on this episode, John the Deacon, Vit. Epp. Meap. in vit.
Sergii.

* In the Church of St. Andrew ad Nidim (now St. Marco dei
tavernari in the via del Salvatore), in Naples, there was still to be
read in the seventeenth century the epitaph of Theodimus. It was
recorded among other things: “Hic in pace membra sunt posita
Theodimi subd(iaconi) reg(ionarii) et rect(oris) sancte sed(is) apos-
t(olice) et disp(ensatoris) hujus diac(oniae) beati Andre.” It is
thought that this deaconry (wrongly printed ad Milum in Duchesne),
was the abode of the rector of the Roman Church who administered
the Neapolitan patrimony—corfus patrimonii Campanie Neafpolitani,
Jaffé, 2218 (1706), etc., from the register of Gregory II. Cf Topograjia
della citta di Napoli nell xt secolo by B. Capasso,

TEE oe ilols

ST. GREGORY IIL. I7I

he was not displeased when he beheld his more or less
independent dukes and the exarch busily engaged in
destroying one another’s power.

The next move on the part of the Lombards was the Capture
capture of Classis,! the seaport of Ravenna, by Farwald IL., ecort

Duke of Spoleto, again in time of peace! By the order of Geen

Liutprand it was restored to the exarch. Nothing could 370"

give a better proof of the weakness of the imperial power
in Italy at this period than this seizing of Classis by a
Lombard duke, and its restitution at the bidding of a
Lombard king. As in the days of Agilulf, Italy would
have fallen altogether into the hands of the Lombards had
it not been for Pope Gregory I.; so would it now in
the days of Liutprand, had it not been for the watchful-
ness, personal influence, and liberally spent money of the
second Gregory.

The Pope well understood the signs of the times. In Gregory

: ; : ks fi
the interval of seeming rest that followed the raids on help from
¢ ; arl
Classis and Cumz, when men said there was peace, yor
Gregory knew there was no peace. He did his best to 7"
meet the storm he saw was brewing. He turned for help,
where Pelagius II. had long before declared? that divine
providence had ordained help to come from, viz., from
the Franks. Gregory wrote for aid to Charles Martel?
1 Paul., H. L., vi. 44. Cf L. P.,n. 13; and Agnellus of Ravenna,
c. 151, under the life of John VII., who became archbishop, c¢. 725.

2 Writing (Oct. 5, 580) to Aunachar, Bishop of Auxerre, Pelagius
says: “ Nec enim credimus, sine magna divine providentize admira-
tione dispositum, quod vestri reges Romano imperio in orthodoxze fidei
confessione sunt similes ; nisi ut huic urbi, ex qua fuerat oriunda, vel
universe Italize finitimos adjutoresque preestaret.”. Ap. Mansi, ix. Cf.

Hist. de Pégl. de France, by Jager, vol. ii., ad an. 580.

3 Cf L. P. in vit. Step. II]. Seeing that no help from the Imperial
power was to be looked for, Stephen wrote to Pippin: “quemadmodum
praedecessores ejus beatee memorize D. Gregorius, et Gregorius alius,
et D. Zacharias .... Carolo Regi Francorum direxerunt, petentes
sibi subveniri propter oppressiones” (Longobardorum).

The Lom-
bards seize
Narni, 724.

Leo III.,
the

Isaurian,
716-741.

172 ST. GREGORY II.

But either Charles had too much to do himself, in the way
of driving back the Saracens, or else he had some under-
standing with his warlike brother-in-law. At any rate, no
help was sent by him. And help was certainly needed if
the power of the Lombards was to be checked.

Somewhere about the year 725, the ‘Lombards,
whether Transamund, Duke of. Spoleto, or Liutprand
himself, is not clear, but probably the former, took! the
important mountain fortified city of Narni, on the
Flaminian Way, and on the frontier of the Roman Duchy.
To add fuel to the flames, there appeared in 726 Leo III.’s
decree against images.

Two military revolutions, which brought to an abrupt
close the short reigns of Anastasius II]. and Theodosius
IIL? raised to the imperial throne the rude warrior,
generally known as Leo (III.) the Isaurian, or as Leo
the Iconoclast. By the force of a strong or unscrupulous
character he had worked himself up from the ranks of
the people to the position of general of the Imperial
army in the central portion of Asia Minor, when in
716 he usurped the empire. By his valour he saved
Constantinople from the Saracens, who besieged it for
nearly a year (September 717-August 718). Had he
persevered in the way in which he began his reign, and
devoted his whole attention to the consolidation of the
empire, weakened as it was at this time as well by
internal dissensions as by the Saracens, he would have
been one of the most useful of the emperors who ruled
at Constantinople. But the same mania for interfering in
matters of religion seized him as took possession of so

17, P., and Paul. Diac., vi. 48. On Narni, o£ Miley’s Papal States,
i. p. 34.

2 Theodosius was orthodox “ita ut hujus fidei fervore omnis ab ecclesia
cessaret questio.” Z.P.,n.5. Cf. the appendix of the deacon Agatho
to the acts of the Sixth General Council.

ST. GREGORY II. 173

many others of the Byzantine Czasars; and he threw
both Church and State into a ferment by his decree
(726) against the worship of zmages.

It is the fashion nowadays with many authors, reversing
the conclusions of former writers, always to speak of the
Iconoclast emperors as great. They follow, at least they
always quote with approval, Schlosser of Heidelberg’s
FTistory of the Iconoclast Emperors—a work which, in
the. judgment of such an acknowledged learned and
impartial author as Héfélé, is “as offensive through
insipid argument as by prejudiced perversion of history.”
Acting, it would seem, on the principle, certainly
erroneous, that because a man belongs to a particular
party, he is therefore so prejudiced that his statements
are not to be believed, authors of such deserved repute
as Professor Bury begin by discounting what is told us
by the ‘Iconodulic chroniclers, whose records, they are
careful to remind us, are the oz/y ones which have come
down to us. They then proceed to enlarge, from sources,
other than those of contemporary writers, on the great
deeds of the Iconoclast emperors. “It is a misfortune,”
writes Bury (ii. 430), “that no historical or other works
composed by Iconoclasts (with the exception of the
Ecloga, which does not deal with Iconoclasm) are
extant....” And yet he unhesitatingly declares the
Iconodules “exaggerated their (the Iconoclast emperors)
faults and calumniated their moral characters.” “As
the Iconodulic chroniclers did not know or did not care
to tell of Leo’s beneficial reforms, we are left in the
dark as to the details”—and one would think, from the
evidence producible, as to the reforms themselves. And
certainly when an effort is made to discover on what
Leo’s title to greatness rests, its foundations seem to be
a rather vanishing quantity. He indeed saved Con-

”

174 ST. GREGORY II.

stantinople from the Saracens. But he was helped not
only by ‘an unusually severe winter, but, as Bury informs
us more than once, by the preparations for a siege that
had been made by his prudent predecessor Anastasius
II. Despite, however, the fearful losses the Saracens
endured under the walls of Constantinople, Leo was
unable to make any real headway against them. And
how much better he would have been employed in
trying to break their power rather than images is
obvious from what Bury (ii. 405) has to write of
their constant inroads into Asia Minor, especially after
the year 726, the year of the edict against the
images !

The Ecloga of Leo, of which so much is made, was
only published in the /as¢ year of his reign (740); and
was but a “handbook in Greek for popular use, con-
taining a short compendium of the most important laws
on the chief relations of life’. Hence, rather to their
intrinsic insignificance than to any hatred of the Isaurian
emperors “by their successors on account of their religious
policy,” should be attributed the fact “that none of their
laws were incorporated in the great ninth century code
of Basil I. and Leo VI.”

Leo was certainly no respecter of the rights of conscience.
To say nothing of his treatment of the image-worshippers,
“four years after his accession, Leo attempted to compel
all the Jews in the Empire to be baptised.... At the
same time he tried to force the Montanists to embrace
the orthodox creed” (Bury, ii. 431).

As little did he respect the pockets of his subjects.
Not only did he rob the popes (732) of 34 talents of
gold (for which act there is no word of condemnation in
Bury), but he increased the taxes readtly (2b., p. 423) and
heavily (tb, p. 437). As a result of his oppressions in

ST. GREGORY IL 175

the domains ot both mind and matter, he had to face
the rebellions of Cosmas (727) and of Italy. No ruler
deserves to be called great, who so little understands
the first principles of government that his measures of
even needful reform should bring about such results.

While Professor Bury tells us that (p. 429) the palace of
Leo’s son Constantine V. (Copronymus) “was constantly
a scene of frivolity and festivity,” he still represents him, as
well as his father, as a man of elevated views. But while
it may be conceded that Leo and Constantine V. by their
determination of character lessened the anarchy which had
preceded their administration, and hence were so far useful
rulers, it is not easy to find any evidence that they were
great rulers, or that the attitude they took up in the
image-controversy was that of men of superior enlighten-
ment struggling against degrading superstition. On the
contrary, there would seem to be evidence that Leo, at
least, attacked what he was too ignorant and uneducated
to understand.

Here it may be observed that a history is no place for a Image
theological treatise. It is no part of the historian’s business ea
to inquire whether the ‘worship of images’ is in accord-
ance with the teachings of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus
Christ; or, on broader grounds, whether it is compatible
with right reason. His sole affair is to explain what
exactly the Iconoclast question was, and to give its
history as he would that of a political intrigue or a war.
Most historians, however, who have treated of the Iconoclast
or ‘image breaking’ controversy have indulged in long
and by no means unimpassioned diatribes on the worship
of images. A word or two, as calm as possible, may there-
fore be permitted here.

There is no question, in the first place, that every Its lawful-

aC ° . i ee ness,
Christian must repudiate all ideas of giving supreme honour

Its utility.

176 ST. GREGORY II.

to images! as gods or the abode of God. And certainly
no Christian who has had any religious instruction whatso-
ever would ever dream of so doing.” But, it is urged, some
Christians have given this supreme worship to images. A
proposition most difficult of proof. Except by individual
confessions it can never be proved. No amount of external
signs that a man may give, apart from a verbal acknow-
ledgment, can ever prove that he has given supreme
worship to anything. The means at our command of
externally showing honour are so limited that the zztensity
of the worship a person may wish to convey by the use of
one or all of those means can only be gauged by one who
knows the mind or intention of him who employs them.
That intention can only be known by express statement.
And how many Christians, it may be asked with confidence,
have ever acknowledged that they have meant to give
supreme honour to an image by any of the acts of
reverence they may have shown it?

At any rate the ignorant say have rendered such
adoration, and certainly by their extravagant attitude to-
wards images they often seem to have given them a worship
which cannot be said to be advisable. All that may be
very true (though it must be borne in mind that with
Eastern or more Southern peoples, very violent outward
demonstration means very little), and raises the questions

1 With Hurter (Zheol. Dogmat. Compend., iii. § 893) it may here be
pointed out—to facilitate accuracy of thought on this subject—that an
image becomes an zdo/ when the material image itself is regarded as
God, or when it represents some non-existing divinity or some created
thing which is regarded as God. Hence a person can only be said to
be an idolater if he worships an image to which he attaches one or
other of these notes.

2 And so St. Stephen (Avnalecta Greca, 1. 497): “Christians have
never said that the matter of the image was to be worshipped. But
we honour what is represented by the image, mentally rising to its
prototype.”

ST. GREGORY II. 177

as to whether the employment of images in religious
worship is useful; and whether, if it is, the abuse does
not take away the use. That images of Our Lord and
His saints are useful to recall or raise even the minds of
the learned to higher things can only be denied by those
who have never tried their utility in that direction, or by
men who have not sufficiently reflected on what creatures
of sense we are. Even the learned pray with some kind of
image before their mind’s eye ; and as the great Protestant
theologian, Leibnitz,' closely argued, “To offer up one’s
adoration before an external image is no more blameworthy
than to do so before the internal image in our minds. The
only use of the external image is to deepen the internal
one.” Never was the utility of zmages as reminders
more realised than at the present day. The universal use
of the camera is proof enough of that. The utility of
images as a means of instruction for the uneducated was
clearly pointed out by St. Gregory the Great in his letter to
Serenus.?

If, zz ztself, however, the utility? of images even in

1 Syst. Theol., p. 140.

2 L. ix, 208 (105). ‘“Idcirco enim pictura in ecclesiis adhibetur, ut
hi, qui litteras nesciunt saltem in parietibus videndo legant, que
legere in codicibus non valent.” Cf xi. 10 (13) of Gregory to the
same bishop. In this connection it is amusing to read (Rome,
Gregorovius, ii. p. 222, Eng. trans.): “Enlightened bishops of Gaul
regarded the idolatrous practices with displeasure. ... When
Serenus,” etc. The enlightened bishops are ‘Serenus’ only, and
Gregory had to rebuke him for fast living and consorting with bad

companions !

3 As many in this country are under the vain delusion that up to
the epoch of the ‘glorious reformation’ our countrymen were simply
idolaters, it may be of interest here to set forth what instruction was
given to the people on the subject of images before that period. A
very popular work, known as Dives e¢ Pauper, probably issued
between 1400 and 1410, says that ‘images’ are useful for three great
ends : (1) to stir men’s minds to. meditate upon the Incarnation of
Christ, and on His life and passion, and on the lives of the saints ;

VOM ie Ee hall: 12

Images
always
used in the
Church,

178 ST. GREGORY II.

religious worship be conceded, does not the dreadful
abuse in practice of ‘image worship’ render the employ-
ment of images for devotional purposes altogether undesir-
able? Emphatically no. In every department, abuse of
good is so rampant, that even the necessary would have to
be given up, if even gross abuse was always a sufficient
excuse for abolishing the use of a thing. Food and drink,
for instance, would be the very first things that would have
to be given up. And in the case of the use of ‘images,’
what abuse there may have been or is in their employment,
has arisen or comes, for the most part, only from the very
stupid or the grossly uninstructed. And surely, in their
case, it is better that they should be led by the use of
images to offer a mistaken worship to God, rather than
that their ignorance or stupidity should keep them from
giving Him any worship at all. So much for ‘image
worship’ in the abstract.

And now, what, as a matter of fact, has been the position
the Church has taken up from the beginning with regard
to the use and worship of images? Anyone can well
understand that in the early ages of Christianity, when
idolatry (z.e., the worship of many gods, who were supposed,
according to the more or less cultured mind of the worshipper,
to be, to a less or greater degree, connected with their
statues) was wellnigh universal, the Church would be very
chary about the use of images. The same caution was
required on account of the early converts from Judaism,
who had a great hatred of images on account of the
frequent falls of their nation into idolatry.

(2) to move the heart to devotion and love; (3) to be a token anda
book to the ignorant people, that they may read in imagery and painting,
as clerks read in books. (Cf an exhaustive analysis of this little work,
ap. Dublin Review, Apr. 1897.)

1 “But,” says St. John Damascene (7yeatise on Images, tr. of Miss
Allies, p. 8), “now we, on the contrary, are no longer in leading

sf. GREGORY Il. 179

The pagans who, we know, ever put their own con-
struction on the little they cared to find out about
Christian teaching, would, of course, have declared that
the Christians worshipped gods as well as they did, had they
seen or heard of their kneeling down and praying before a
statue. But with all that, the early Christians, fully alive
to the advantages of ‘images’ as aids to piety, did not fail
to use them from the very beginning. Witness their use
of images of the ‘fish’ + They carried the ‘fish’ about with
them in life; they had it laid by their sides in death.

Comparing the famous caricature graffito of the
Crucifixion found on one of the walls of the Palace of
the Czesars on the Palatine hill, and now in the Kircherian
Museum, with the common accusation of the Heathens
against the Christians, viz., that they worshipped crosses,?
proves at least that the Christians venerated crucifixes and
crosses from the éarlzest times. The ardent words of
St. Paul about the Cross of Christ, and the fact that from
the earliest ages the Christians gloried in making the‘ sign +

strings. ... It is given to us to avoid superstitious error.” The
saint seems to have written his Ovadions on the Image Question at
the close of the pontificate of St. Gregory II]. He dedicated his work
to the Pope, to “the holy shepherd of Christ’s orthodox flock, who
represents in his own person Christ's priesthood” (7, p. 3).
Though it may be that these words refer to Germanus, the patriarch
of Constantinople, who was in the forefront of the opposition to the
Iconoclast Leo.

1 This emblem was, of course, used by the Christians, because the
letters of the Greek word for fish (ix@s) give in Greek the initial
letters of “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Saviour.” Cf. De Rossi, Roma
Sott.; and Northcote and Brownlow’s work in English on the same
subject, vols. i. and ii. “

2 Cf. Min. Felix in Oct, §§ 9, 12, 29; Origen, contra Celsum, il. 47 ;
and Tertullian (Afo/., c. 16), who says the Christians were called
‘worshippers of the Cross ’—‘ religiosi crucis.’

3 Gal. vi. 14. “God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross
of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” etc.

4 Cf, the well-known passage of Tertullian’s (De coron. milit., c. 3)

180 ST. GREGORY II.

of the Cross’ on themselves, quite prepare us to find a
veneration for the ‘image of the Cross.’

It is not, however, contended that ‘image worship, for
the reasons alluded to above, made any great progress in
the public worship of the Church till after the conversion of
Constantine in the fourth century. Some will have it that
the council of Elvira in Spain, held about the year 300
(306?), condemned the use of pictures in the churches?
After the conversion of Constantine, however, the ¢vzwmph
of Christianity in Europe, by precluding any likelihood of
a general return to idolatry, rendered the introduction of
images into the churches comparatively safe. Accordingly,
that they were then promptly and freely introduced into
the churches is scarcely called in question, as the fact is so

on this subject, where he says that “Whenever they went out or
returned home, whenever.they clothed or washed themselves, when-
ever they sat down to table or lay down to rest, they signed their
foreheads with the sign of the Cross.”

1 The prohibition occurs in the 36th canon, and reads: “ Placuit
picturas in Ecclesiis esse non debere, ne, quod colitur et adoratur, in
parietibus depingatur.” Not much can be made out of this quotation
by ancient or modern Iconoclasts (though the moderns, ¢.g., Hodgkin,
vi. 431, never fail to quote it), for the simple reason that it is far from
clear what the canon really means. Some think it forbids ‘images’
to be painted on the walls of the churches, either because they might
be injured by the damp and made unsightly, and so, very far from
objects of devotion ; or because, if persecution broke out again, the
pictures could not be removed, and so the Christian religion would be
insulted in those pictures. Others contend, with good show of reason,
that there was question in this canon of images of God, Who of course
cannot be painted as He is in Himself. For they point out that the
very words of the canon show this; as they give the reason why the
images must not be painted on the walls—“lest what is worshipped
and adored (z.e., with supreme worship, viz., God) be painted on walls.”
No sane man calls it in question that God cannot be represented as He
is. Finally, in any case, all that can at most be extracted from the
canon is that, under the circumstances—a fierce persecution was going
on at the time—the Spanish bishops thought fit to forbid the intro-
duction of images into the churches at that particular period (cf
Perrone’s Prelectiones Theol., ii. p. 440 seg., ed. Paris, 1856).

“ST. GREGORY II. 181

abundantly demonstrated not only by the ‘very stones
themselves’ (¢,¢., by the figures on sarcophagi, mosaics,
etc.), but by the testimony of the Fathers.

This general use of ‘images’ Leo III. thought to abolish
by: hisjedictaof thet year 7267) “Adter-the:tenth year of
his reign,” says the deacon Stephen, who wrote in 808
the life and martyrdom of St. Stephen the younger,
“Leo proclaimed: ‘Since the making of images is an
idolatrous art, they (the images) ought not to be adored.’ ”
It is very unfortunate that we do not know for certain
the motives that impelled Leo to attack holy images.
However, as Theophanes was almost contemporary
with the beginnings of Iconoclasm, it will be best to
follow his guidance in our efforts to get at the truth in
this matter.

In the year 722, urged on by a lying Jew, who promised
him forty years of rule (which, needless to say, he did not
get), Yezid II., the Ommiade Caliph of Damascus, issued
a decree® against the use of images in the Christian
Churches of his dominions.

And we are assured that in Egypt, at any rate,
the treasurer el-Habhab, in accordance with “the Caliph’s
order, carried out (722) a general destruction of the
sacred pictures of the Christians.” The Caliph’s early
death, however, prevented his decree from having any
lasting* effect in his own realm. But it made an

' Cf, eg., the well-known passage of St. Basil, Hom., 17 n. 3 (OP.,
ed. Garnier, ii. p. 141).

2 Indictione nona, says an anonymous author (who flourished about
770), published by Combefis; Theoph., Chvom., ad an. 718, also gives
the same date.

8 A History of Egypt in the Middle Ages, by Stanley Lane-Poole,

mais
: $ eee Chron., ad an. 715 ; and the narration of the monk John,
delivered to the Fathers of the Eighth General Council: in their fifth
session,

Leo's
decree
against
‘image
worship,
726.

Leo's edict
of 726.

182 ST. GREGORY II.

impression on the uneducated? mind of Leo. This
unfavourable impression against ‘images’ entertained by
Leo was deepened by one Beser, who had apostatised
in Syria, apparently whilst a slave. His strength
of body and kindred character introduced him to
the notice and friendship of Leo.2 Then, doubtless,
on the principle ot hating what one has wronged, he
never failed to instil into Leo his Mohammedan notions
on the subject of images. Another evil adviser of the
emperor was Constantine, Bishop of Nacolia, a man
whom Theophanes describes? as thoroughly impure and
ignorant. Thus, on the testimony of Theophanes, than
whom on this matter we have no better authority, and
whose testimony there is no reason to doubt, the two
chief instigators of the Iconoclast reform (?) were an
apostate and an immoral bishop!

A movement against images, begun by Leo in 725, was
quickened into the formal edict of 726, forbidding their
use altogether, by a convulsion of nature. A terrific vol-
canic eruption threw up a new island in the group of the
Cyclades, and covered with ashes the coasts of Asia Minor
Beser and the emperor saw in this eruption a portent
urging them on. Amid great commotion a famous image
of Our Lord above the great gateway (known as the
Brazen Gateway) of the emperor’s palace was smashed
to pieces. The soldier who did the deed was slain,
and a tumult followed. But Leo put it down with a

1 Theoph., Chron., ad an. 718, says he was “ plenus imperitize.”

2 Theoph., ad an. 715.

* 1. There is no call to mention here the later Greek narratives in
connection with the causes that led Leo to his attack on ‘images’;
nor the inventions of moderns, who ascribe his action in the matter of
images to his wish to convert the Jews and Saracens.

4 Theoph., ad an. 718; Nicephorus, De redus post Mauritium
gestis, also gives this account in as many words.

ST. GREGORY II. 183

strong hand, and punished its supporters with exile,
mutilation! and confiscation. The nature of the reform
desired by Leo may be gathered from the fact that his
persecution was particularly directed against the noble
and the learned, with the result that schools were broken
up which had flourished from the days of Constantine
the Great* “

The immediate result of Leo’s decree, and perhaps also Revolt in
of some special heavy tax® which he imposed at this time ae
(727) was a rising in Greece. One Cosmas was _pro-
claimed emperor. A fleet of the rebels arrived off Con-
stantinople (April 18, 727), but the dread ‘Greek fire’ was
more than a match for it. Cosmas was executed, and
the emperor raged * more than ever against the worshippers
of images.

The same two causes brought about commotions in
Italy, which were not so easily laid to rest as those in
Greece; and when they had subsided, they left the
imperial power in Italy a mere shadow of what it was,
and that of the Pope the only one able to oppose any

1 Theoph., ad an. 718; Vit. Steph., jun.; “ Considera,” writes the monk
Theosterictus, soon after the year 824, “hanc (hzresim) ab imperatoria
potestate fuisse ab initio valentissimam.” Ap. Bolland. Acta SS.,
April 3.

2 “Imprimis autem in eos (animadversum fuerit) qui genere et
doctrina clarebant, adeo ut scholee una cum sacra doctrina exciderint,
que a seculo sancti Constantini magni usque ad ea tempora
floruerant.”. Theoph., zd. Latin version.

3 Chronologists have often called attention to the fact that from 727
to 774 the indictions and the ‘anno mundi’ in Theophanes do not
tally. Most chronologists have got into the habit of accepting his
‘years of the indiction, and rejecting his ‘years of the world.’ But
Bury (Later Roman Emp., ii. pp. 425-7) gives some good reasons for
adopting the other course, and he supposes that probably for fiscal
reasons an indiction was suppressed ; so that 727 represents the roth
to the 12th indiction. By this device Leo would probably get two
years’ taxes in one |

4 Theoph,, ad an, 718, Nicephorus, etc,

Attempts
on the
Pope's
life,
725-6-7.

184 ST. GREGORY II.

resistance to the JLombards, who took occasion of the
disorder to still further enlarge their territory.

On the authority of Theophanes, as has been said above,
it was in the year 725 that Leo first began to make a
movement against the use of ‘images.’ Probably in the
same year, whether on their own authority, with a view
of hereafter gaining Leo’s favour, or at his direct command,
as the Book of the Popes expressly states, a certain duke
Basil, the Cartularius (assessor) Jordanes, and a subdeacon
Lurion formed a conspiracy to kill the Pope. This
conspiracy received the encouragement of Marinus, who
had been sent from Constantinople to govern the Duchy
of Rome. The unfolding of the plot was checked for
a time by the enforced departure from Rome of
Marinus in consequence of illness. When Paul came
as exarch (726-7) into Italy, the conspirators re-
sumed their work. But the Romans, discovering their
dark designs, extinguished them in the blood of their
authors.”

Meanwhile, in the latter half of the year 726, there was
published, in Constantinople, Leo’s edict against the use
of ‘images’ in the churches, and likely enough, at the
same time, notice of a very heavy special tax, for the
purposes of which Bury supposes® that the emperor
suppressed a year of the indiction. Apparently, and as
might be expected, the notice of the exorbitant tax was
the first toreach Italy. As a leader “of a lawful opposi-
tion to the tyranny of imperial administration,’ * Gregory
contended against the imposition of the said tax. And

1 Basilius .... Jordanes .... et Lurion consilium inierunt, ut
Pontificem interficerent. Quibus assensum Marinus .. . . zmferatore
mandante hoc probavit.” ZL. P.

2078

3 Cf. sup., p. 183, note 3.
4 Finlay, Hist. of the Byzantine Emp., p. 64.

ST. GREGORY IL 185

because he did so,! the exarch, at the command of the
emperor, began to concert measures for taking Gregory’s
life, putting another in his place, and plundering his
churches. An army was accordingly despatched from
Ravenna to carry out these tyrannical intentions. But
that they should be put into execution suited neither
the Romans nor the Lombards. The Lombards did not
wish any increase of the power of the exarch; and the
Romans were resolved that no harm should come to
their beloved Pope. Combined Roman? and Lombard
forces therefore caused the exarch’s army to return with-
out accomplishing its purpose.

At length, after this repulse of the exarch? the
emperor's decrees against ‘images’ were published in his
Italian dominions, perhaps at the end of the year 726,
but probably at the very beginning of 727. The Pope
was informed that if he interfered with these decrees, as
he had in the matter of the tax, he would be degraded.
On the contrary, if he acquiesced he would meet with
the emperor’s favour.* At once Italy was in a storm!

1 “Paulus .... Imperatoris jussione .... Pontificem conabatur
interficere .... e€0 quod censum in provincia ponere przepediebat,”
ie, Maia

2 “Sed motis Romanis atque undique Longobardis pro defensione
Pontificis in Salario ponte Spoletini, atque hinc inde Duces Longo-
bardorum circumdantes Romanorum fines hoc prepedierunt.” 0,
Of course it may have been that the Lombards of Central Italy, who
seem to have been the principal movers in this affair, supported the
Pope, as they wished his support against the king, of whom they
wished to be independent ; or, again, motives of common humanity
may have urged the Lombards to the course they took in this matter.
As far as any certainty is concerned, we are really in the dark as to
the secret springs of the action of the Lombards of Mid-Italy at this
period.

8 “Jussionibus itaque Zostmodum missis, decreverat Imperator, ut
nulla imago,” etc. 70.

4 “Si acquiesceret in hoc (decreto) Pontifex gratiam Imperatoris
haberet ; si e¢ Hoc fieri preepediret, a suo gradu decideret ” (22. ).

Leo’s
decrees
against
‘images’
arrive in
Italy, 727.

The Lom-
bards take
Ravenna,
BiCs 7275

186 ST. GREGORY IL.

The Pope, whose “ political and ecclesiastical position
entitled him to make a direct opposition to Iconoclasm,” ?
at once took action, and wrote? in all directions to warn
the people against the teachings of the emperor. The
subjects of the empire took more decided measures. They
flew to arms in defence of the Pope; they anathematised
the exarch and the one who had commissioned him ; and
consulted for their own safety and liberty by electing
dukes for themselves all over Italy.2 They even resolved
to elect an emperor for themselves and to lead him to
Constantinople. But this intention Gregory contrived to
divert,t as he hoped for the conversion of the emperor.
In the midst of this general defection, some, of course,
took up the emperor’s cause; among others the Duke
Exhilaratus, on insufficient authority sometimes called the
Duke of Naples. He marched on Rome with his son
Hadrian, calling on the people to obey Leo and kill
the Pope. The people replied by killing Azm. In
Ravenna also Paul, the exarch, tried to form a party
for the emperor, and he also was slain in the tumult
that ensued (727).

Now, of course, was the time for the Lombards. They

1 Finlay, Hist. of the Byzantine Emp., p. 46.

2 “ Scribens ubique cavere se Christianos” (Z. P.).

3 “QOmnes Pentapolenses atque Venetiarum exercitus Imperatoris
jussionem restiterunt;... ubique in Italia Duces elegerunt,” etc.
Jo. The Lombard deacon (vi. 49) is in general accord with all this
narrative.

4 “ Omnis Italia consilium iniit, ut sibi eligerent Imperatorem . “
sed compescuit tale consilium Pontifex.” Z.P. Cf Paul. Diac., H. L.;
vi. 49.

5 LZ. P. The Duke of Rome, Peter, was also driven out of the city
for taking part against the Pope—the same (?) Peter who opposed
Pope Constantine. ZL. P. Vid. swf., p. 137. Hadrian, it should be
noted, probably had a personal spite against the Pope, as Gregory
had had to excommunicate him (cf canons 14 and 15 of the Roman
Council of 721) for an unlawful marriage with a deaconess,

ST. GREGORY II. 187

availed themselves of it. In the first place Ravenna
itself fell into their hands. Both from the Book of the
Popes and the Lombard deacon} it is certain that Liut-
prand took and destroyed Classis, the harbour of Ravenna,
and besieged Ravenna itself. That siege seems to have
occurred (717) some years before the capture of Narni,
and not to have resulted in the capture of the city. It
is certain, however, that Ravenna was captured some-
where about this time, as particulars of its capture are
given by Agnellus,? and of its recapture by John the
Deacon? (who wrote some 250 years after this) and
Paul the Deacon.t When it was actually taken can-
not be laid down with any certainty. But from the
first letter of Gregory to the emperor, of which
more hereafter, it would appear that Ravenna fell into
the power of the Lombards for a short time in the
year 727. There also fell, without much difficulty,
under the rule of the Lombards, the Pentapolis—or
the district around the five cities of Rimini, Pesaro, Fano,
Ancona, and Umana—and various other places. Among
others, Liutprand seized (727-8) Sutri,° an important town
in the Roman Duchy on the Cassian road. This place,
however, in response to the entreaties and money of

1 VI" 49:

2 In his life of St. John, 39th Bishop of Ravenna; ¢f note to vi. 49
in Migne’s ed. of Paul the Deacon ; and Muratori, Anal, ad an. 728.
Agnellus, c. 1 (ap. Murat., 2. J. S., II. i.) concludes : “ Inimici ingressi
civitatem et eam subverterunt.” Duchesne (Z. P., i. p. 412), who
rejects the two letters of Gregory II. to Leo, and who cannot believe
that the biographer of Gregory II., with his political leanings, would
omit to notice the capture of Ravenna, but that the non-political
biographer of Gregory III. might, assigns this capture to the reign of
Gregory III., but before 735. é'

2 Cron. Venez. Antichis, i. p. 95, ed. Monticolo. Cf Hodgkin,
vi. p. 487 f.

CEASE ;

5 Cf. Miley's Hist. of the Papal States, 1. 71.

Council in
Rome
against
Tcono-
clasm, 727.

188 ST. GREGORY II.

the Pope, the Lombard restored “to the apostles Peter
andaPanul.y *

Meanwhile, besides thus doing what he could to check
the encroachments of the Lombards, Gregory did not
neglect to take steps to hinder the spread of the new
heresy. Besides writing the warning letters we have
alluded to, but of the contents of which we know nothing,
he called a council in Rome (towards the close of 727) to
deliberate on the best measures to be adopted to counteract
the evil. This synod is spoken of by Pope Hadrian I.
in the letter? which he wrote to Charlemagne (794) in
answer to his ‘capitular’ (the Caroline books). Pope
Hadrian quotes a little of Gregory’s speech to the Fathers
of this council. Among other points, the Pope insisted *
“that images and pictures must be so kept and loved that
their usefulness might not be spoilt by contempt, and this
irreverence redound to the injury of those whose images
they are ; and that, on the other hand, the integrity of the
faith might not be hurt by excessive worship ; and that too
much honour given to material things might not be an
argument that we think too little of spiritual” Several of
the Pope’s arguments “ have so great a similarity with some
passages of the two letters (yet to be spoken of) of Gregory

1 “Sed Pontificis multis continuis scriptis atque commonitionibus ad
Regem missis, quamvis multis datis muneribus, . .. . castrum
(Sutriense) donationem b. App.,Petro et Paulo.... Rex restituit
atque donavit” (Z. P.). This restitution is dated in the Z. P. 11th
indiction, and was made probably in the beginning of the year 728.
Some see in it the beginning of the ‘temporal power.’

2 Ap. Mansi, xiii. 759. Labbe, vil. 947, etc. A fragment of the acts
of this council has been published by Card. Mai (SAzczz. Rom., vi.).
This synod is also spoken of by the Liber Synodicus, Zonaras and
Cedrenus. Cf Héfélé, Eng. trans., v. 301.

8 This lucid pronouncement on the image question of Pope Gregory
was cited in the council of 769, held by Pope Stephen IV., a fragment

of which was preserved by Albinus (fl. 1184), and is printed by Mai,
ubi sup., Pp. XVi.

ST. GREGORY II. 189

to the emperor, that we may suppose that Gregory
delivered in the synod the principal part of what he wrote
to the emperor.t But what did he write to the emperor?
This question brings us to the two famous letters of
Gregory to Leo. There are to be found appended to the
Acts of the Seventh General Council two letters in Greek,
letters which were not read at that council, but which, first
found by the Jesuit scholar Fronto Duczeus, were added
to the Acts of the Seventh General Council as pertaining
thereto, and purporting to be from Pope Gregory II. to Leo
III. Up till comparatively recently these letters had
always been accepted as genuine. Now their authenticity,
on what seem to us insufficient grounds, has been called in
question by Duchesne, Hodgkin, etc. While it is allowed
that the ‘documentary testimony’ in their favour is fair
—for MSS. copies of the letters, dating as far back as
perhaps the tenth century have been found—it is urged
that the internal evidence furnished by the letters is
against their genuineness. Such evidence must be strong
before it can suffice to upset what has been long accepted,
and for which there is satisfactory external evidence. The
chief argument against the authenticity of the letters is their
alleged coarseness. No doubt there is some plain speaking
in them. But if it is a question of balancing the very
courtly style of Pope Gregory I. to Maurice or Phocas, with
the unpolished directness of the letters in question to the
uneducated Leo, one ought rather to prefer the latter, and be
thankful that the times and the man were such as to permit
of a rude tyrant, who was interfering with conscience,”
being told the simple truth in unvarnished language.

1 Héfélé, 26. That Gregory did write to Leo is what we might have
been sure of a friorz, and what we are informed by Theophanes
(ad ann. 717, 721).

2 St. John Damascene (Ox Jmages, p. 76 of the tr. of Miss Allies)
upbraids his opponents for following “a gospel. ... of Leo. I do

First letter
of the Pope
to Leo,

727°

190 ST, GREGORY It.

The first letter! then, of Gregory to Leo on the subject of
Iconoclasm was despatched at the close of the year 727,”
and was to the following effect. The Pope began by
reminding Leo that in ten letters he had promised to
observe the doctrines of the Fathers. “If anyone removes
the ordinances of the Fathers,” said you, “let him be
anathema.” For ten years sacred images have not been
mentioned by you. Now you say, “they take the part of
idols,” and you add (Exod. xx. 4): “Thou shalt not make
to thyself any graven thing,” etc. “ But why have you not
questioned wise men on this subject before disturbing and
perplexing poor people? You could then have learnt of
what kind of images God gave that command.”....
“TI am forced? to write to you in a rough simple style,
as you yourself are uneducated and uncultivated.” The
Pope then shows that God, who gave the command
about not making graven things (of a certain kind), yet
Himself ordered their making for His worship (Exod.
XXv. seg.); and that men who had seen Our Lord and
His martyrs, made pictures of them for others, who, leaving
the worship of the devil, venerated these images, not
absolutely (with the worship of Zatrza), but relatively... .4
not admit,” he adds, “an emperor’s tyrannical action in domineering
over the Church.”

1 The other arguments against the authenticity of these letters are
treated of in an Appendix.

2 On the date of this letter see the close reasoning of Héfélé,
fist. of the Councils, v. 298-301. The translation of the letter given

in Héfélé, zd., 298 f., is here freely used.
3 One of the objected coarse passages: “ avdykny exouev ypawar oor

/ > ?
maxéa kal araldevta, Scmep ef dwaldevros kal raxvs.’

4 “Of tyvOpwmor abevres Tas TpogKUVho Ets TOD SiaBdAou, TabTas mpogéeKevynoay
ov AaTpevTIKGs adAAa oxeTiKws.” Many authors, who make profession of
understanding much more recondite matters, boggle at the distinction
between absolute and relative honour. But everybody understands
that, while he may be attached to the portrait of a mother, the
love he has for it is very different from that which he has for the

mother herself. Give two Greek names to these two different degrees

ST. GREGORY It. tot

“You say: We worship stones and walls and boards. But
it is not so,O Emperor; but they serve us for remem-
brance and encouragement, lifting our slow spirits upwards,
by those whose names the pictures bear and whose
representations they are. And we worship them not
as God, as you maintain, God forbid! ....” Stop,
continues the Pope, the scandal you are causing.
“Even the little children mock at you. Go into one
of their schools, say that you are the enemy of images,
and straightway they will throw their little tablets at
your head,’ and what you have failed to learn from the
wise you may pick up from the foolish. You wrote: ‘As
the Jewish King Ozias cast the brazen serpent out of
the temple after eight hundred years (2 Kings xviii. 4),
so J after eight hundred years cast the images out of the
Churches.’ Yes, Ozias was your brother, and, like you,
did violence to the priests.2.... In virtue of the power
which has come down to us from St. Peter, the Prince
of the Apostles, we might inflict a punishment upon you,
but since you have invoked one on yourself? have that,
you and the counsellors you have chosen,... . though
you have so excellent a high priest, our brother Germanus,
whom you ought to have taken into your counsels as father
and teacher.... The dogmas of the Church are not

of love, and remember that it is with honour as with love, and then—
behold the mystery !

1 This is, of course, one of the ‘low’ passages. But who will say
that the remark was not well deserved ?

21]. Paralip. xxvi. 19. “Ozias .... threatened the priests.”
There is some blundering here, either on the part of the Pope or the
emperor. It was the good king /zechtas who “broke the brazen
serpent.” Perhaps it was the emperor’s mistake, as the Pope says,
“you wrote,” etc., and it did not suit the Pope’s purpose or argument
to correct the mistake.

3 See above, where Leo says, “If any one removes the ordinances of
the Fathers, let him be anathema.”

Second
letter of
Pope
Gregory,
728.

192 ST. GREGORY IL

a matter for the emperor, but for the bishops.” The
Pope then goes on to point out some of the unhappy
consequences of the emperor’s conduct; he tells how,
when news of the destruction of the figure of Our Lord
at the Brazen Gate, and of the subsequent massacres,
had reached the West, the imperial laurel-crowned busts
(laureata) were smashed and the Lombards took advantage
of the general confusion to seize even Ravenna. But you
say, “I will carry off Pope Gregory a prisoner as Constans
(II.) did Martin.” After pointing out what would be the
folly of such a proceeding, as he acts as a peacemaker
between the East and West, Gregory adds that in any
case he has only to go a few miles? out of Rome and then
the emperor might just as well pursue the wind. “ Would
that it might be the will of God, that Pope Martin’s lot
might be mine.” “Still,” adds the Pope, “as, though quite
unworthy, the whole West trusts in us, and in St. Peter, whom
men here regard as an earthly god,? I am willing to live.”
That the emperor replied to the above letter we know
from the second letter of the Pope, in which he expresses
his grief that the emperor has made it clear by his letter
that he (the emperor) has not changed his attitude towards

1 The ‘ three miles’ (24 stadia) that the Pope speaks of have been a
great difficulty to most historians, because they have made up their
minds that the Pope intended to fly to the Lombards, and they cannot
believe that the Lombard territory came within three miles of Rome at
that time. But the cue to the meaning of the Pope’s words is found
towards the close of the letter, where the Pope says that the emperor
cannot protect the Roman duchy, but only the city of Rome, because
his ships—his only power—can get at it. ‘“Scis Romam defendere
imperium tuum non posse, nisi forte solam urbem propter adjacens tli
mare ac navigia” (Latin version). Hence, out of Rome, the Pope is
safe from the emperor.

2 Fond indeed of “making mountains out of mole hills” must
historians be to write as follows (Gregorovius, zst. of Rome, ii. p. 232,
note); “Peter was thus explained to be God, and that by the Pope
himself! !” After that the deluge !

ST. GREGORY II. 193

holy images and refuses to follow even the Greek Fathers.
Again the Pope reminds Leo that doctrines are matters
not for emperors but for bishops, who “have the mind

(vow) “of Christ)". 2. . You persecute and tyrannise over
us with military and physical force. We, unarmed and
defenceless,. . . . invoke the Leader of armies,. . . . Jesus

Christ, that he may send thee a demon, according to that
of the apostle (1 Cor. v. 5), ‘deliver such a one to Satan for
the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved
mitherday-or Our Lord yess Christ, < -. .-W ou ask,,
continues Gregory, quoting from the emperor’s reply,
“how it was that nothing was decreed about images in
the six general councils.” For the same reason, retorts
the Pope, that it was not decreed that bread had to be
eaten and water drunk. Men had as much the habit of
venerating images as they had of eating bread and
drinking water. Gregory might have added that at least
by the Quinisext Council, which the Greeks classed with
the Sixth General Council, the worship of images was
practically recognised, for it decreed respect to the Cross.
“Reverence for the holy cross requires that the form of
the cross shall never be found on the floor, so that it may
never be trodden under foot” (can. 73). In conclusion
the Pope prays for the emperor’s conversion, and that all
may be brought back into the one true fold of Christ.
Much about the same time that Gregory wrote his first Gregory

exerts him-

letter to Leo on image worship (viz., towards the end of ae
recovery O

727), he wrote to Ursus, doge of Venice, and to Antoninus, Ravenna,
patriarch of Grado, in the same terms, urging them to ive
stand by the exarch (that must be the new exarch

1 The letter to Ursus is to be found in Dandolo’s Chronicle, ap.
Murat., R. Z. S., xii.; Mansi, xii. 244, etc. ; the other in the Chronicle
of John the Deacon, ap. Pertz, M. G. SS. vii. 12, or Cron. Venez,
i, ed. Monticolo.

VOL. I. PT. IL. ie

Eutychius
makes an
attempt on
the Pope’s
life, 728.

194 ST. GREGORY IL

Eutychius), who, the Pope heard,! was in Venice, and in his
(the Pope’s) stead to fight with the ‘ unspeakable’ Lombards
(they were probably then holding Sutri) for the recovery
of Ravenna. Ravenna was, in fact, retaken, probably in the
early part of the year 728, after it had only been in the
hands of the Lombards for a month or two, which may
account for its speedy recovery. It may be thought, from
all the events we have assigned to the year 727, that things
must have moved quickly at that time. Probably, from
the energetic character of the principal agents, Leo and
Gregory, they did. Even the exarch Eutychius seems to
have been a man of more enterprise than most of those
who had preceded him in his office.

After the recapture of Ravenna, Eutychius, at the
command of the emperor, proceeded to Naples, whence it
was thought he might the more easily operate against the
Pope, and effect what had so often been attempted in vain
before. Accordingly the exarch sent an emissary to Rome,
with instructions to compass the death of the Pope and
the chief nobility. The plot transpired, and, but for the
interposition of the Pope, its author would have been
slain. Indignant at what had occurred, the citizens, great
and small, bound themselves by oath to die rather than
suffer their noble bishop to be harmed in any way. Not to
be baulked, Eutychius endeavoured by promise of liberal
presents to the king and the dukes of the Lombards to turn
them against the Pope. In vain. Romans and Lombards
“bound themselves together with the bonds of faith,”?

1 “Fxarchus, ut cognovimus, apud Venetias moratur; .... cum eo
nostra vice (debeat nobilitas tua) decertare.” Gundlach, who has also
edited these letters (ap. 17. G. E/#., iii. p. 702), gives in a note the
various theories which have been entertained as to their authorship
and even authenticity.

? L. P., from which this paragraph is taken almost verbally. “Sed
ne desisterent ab amore vel fide Romani imperii, ammonebat.”

ST. GREGORY II. 195

declaring they were ready to die rather than that harm
should come to such a glorious champion of the Christian
faith. But, adds the papal biographer, the Pope placed
greater trust in the abundant alms he gave to the poor,
and in prayer and fasting, to which he earnestly devoted
himself. And while thanking the people for their good-
will, he exhorted them to be earnest in the faith, and in
the performance of good works, and begged them “not to
swerve from the love and fidelity which they owed to the
Roman Empire.” Certainly it was not the Pope’s fault if
the Roman people at this epoch threw off the yoke of a
rotten empire, which, utterly unable to protect them from
the foreigner, could only find strength to try and wring
from them their money or their faith, With the facts of
history and any elementary knowledge of ethics to guide
them, it is truly wonderful how certain English authors
descant about the loyalty due1(?) from the Pope and the
Italian people to the emperor at this time—Englishmen
who, of course, do not believe in any ‘ divine right of kings’
who govern well, let alone who govern wrongly.

In the East, the emperor continued to work for the Soe ae
establishment of his heresy. He tried, privately at first manus,
(728), to gain over the holy patriarch Germanus to publish ee
a declaration in favour of the destruction of images, know-
ing well that if he succeeded with him his work would be
more than half done. The attempt failed, and Germanus
notified it to the Pope. Gregory at once wrote? (728) to

1 Of course there are some who speak in a more manly way.
Gibbon (Decline, etc., iii. c. 49), when treating of these affairs, remarks
of the temporal dominion of the popes, that “their noblest title is the
free choice of a people whom they had redeemed from slavery.” It
may be noted here, that, in the light of modern scholarship, much of
this chapter of Gibbon’s stands in need of rewriting.

2 His letter is to be found among the documents of the fourth session
of the Seventh General Council, ap. Mansi, xiii.; Migne, P. Z., t. 129,

p. 317 t

196 ST, GREGORY It.

Leo
deposes the
patriarch
Germanus,
729-30.

the patriarch to tell him the joy that his (Germanus’)
‘honourable letter’ had brought him. He feels that he
must write and greet Germanus, his brother, and champion
of the Church, and praise him for the struggle he has
so nobly maintained—a struggle which has left the em-
peror defeated. Then the Pope goes on to show that
Germanus acted rightly in defending the use of holy
images, as honour rendered to an image passes on to what
it represents. “If God had not become man we should
not represent Him in human form.” .... “The images
of those things which do not exist, the inventions of pagan
poetry, ‘are called ‘idols?’.". 4. “The: Church tof Christ
has nothing to do with idols.” .... “Christians? only
worship and adore with the worship of ‘latria’ the Blessed
Trinity.” .... “If, however, anyone in Jewish fashion (a
reference doubtless to the Jewish advisers or proclivities of
the emperor), misusing the words of the Old Testament
which were of old directed against idolatry, accuses our
Church of idolatry, we can only hold him for a barking
dog.” Then, very pointedly, Gregory proceeds to urge that
if only the Jews themselves had paid more attention to
the ‘images’ which were used in their own worship—the
rod of Moses, the ark, the tabernacle, the cherubim, etc.—
they would not have so often turned to idolatry. By the
prayers of the Mother of God, and all the saints, Gregory
in conclusion trusts that Germanus may long be preserved
to teach the way of truth, learnt from the Fathers,

Leo was not, however, at the end of his resources.
He tried to crush the resolution of Germanus by break-
ing him when in contact with already ‘broken reeds.’
Acting like our own tyrants, Henry I. with St. Anselm
and Henry II. with St. Thomas of Canterbury, he

1 garnyopelrw undels, bry mydty ray dvrwy Td dvoua . . . 6 Aads TOD Xpiorou

.. TAhy Tis wylas.... Tpiddos eoeBaoOn, 7) eAarpevoe.

ST. GREGORY IL. 197

brought Germanus before a council (called by the Greeks
a ‘Silentium’—a very good namie, as a general rule,
for an assembly presided over by the ‘master of many
legions’) composed of his creatures, both cleric and lay
(729, or January 7, 730). Germanus was not to be over-
awed, but, finding he could effect no good, he took off
his pallium, the mark of his archiepiscopal dignity,
saying: “If I am Jonas, cast me into the sea. Without
the authority’ of a general council, O emperor, no in-
novation can I make in matters of faith.” Then, adds
the chronicler, Germanus retired to his ancestral home
and passed the few remaining years of his old age in
retirement. And his ambitious disciple Anastasius, who
for power had_ sacrificed his conscience, was made
patriarch in his stead (January 22, 730). But, of
course, both he and his synodal letter were rejected by
Pope Gregory,? who threatened to depose him if he did
not renounce his heresy.
Whilst Leo in the East was persecuting the orthodox Alliance

between

with mutilation and death,? his exarch was pushing his ne ear
an 1ut-

cause in Italy. Eutychius had at last managed to bring prand, 729.

1 “ Absque universalis etenim concilii auctoritate, imperator, circa
fidem quidquam innovare non valeo” (Theoph., Chron., ad an. 721,
Latin version). With Theophanes on all this affair, cp. Nicephorus
and the life of St. Stephen the Younger. “And now,” says the great
contemporary champion of the holy images, “holy Germanus, shining
by word and example, has been punished and become an exile, and
many more bishops and fathers whose names are unknown to us”
(St. Jahn Damascene, 7reatise on Images, p. 70 of Miss Allies’
translation).

2 Theoph., 23.; the Z. P. says: “Rescriptis commonitoriis nisi ad
Catholicam converteretur fidem, etiam extorrem a sacerdotali officio
esse mandavit.”

3 7. P. “Aliquanti capite truncati, alii partem corporis excisi.”
Theoph. (2é.), “multi clerici et monachi et devoti laici... . martyrii
corona fuerint redimiti.” Cf Ep. 86 of Nicholas I. to the emperor

Michael, ap. Migne, t. 119, p. 930.

198 ST. GREGORY II.

about an alliance with the Lombard king, on the under-
standing that they were to help one another, till Liutprand
reduced to complete subjection the almost independent
dukes of Spoleto and Benevento, and till Eutychius was
able to work his will at Rome. Liutprand, with his
usual adroitness, got what he wanted done first. Then
the two armies marched on Rome, and encamped on
the plain of Nero, between the Vatican hill, Monte
Mario and the Tiber. But again the personal influence
of a Pope saved Rome. Perhaps from what we have
already seen of the character of Liutprand, it was not
very hard to persuade him to abandon the cause of the
exarch. However that may be, Gregory so moved the
Lombard king that he threw himself on his knees before
the Pope and promised not to harm anyone. Then, after
laying down before the body of St. Peter his royal mantle,
his spear, and his crown, and reconciling the exarch to
the Pope, he withdrew his troops.?

See As though for the one purpose of bringing into still

7305 "clearer relief the forgiving nature of the Pope, whilst
the exarch was in Rome a certain Petasius, taking the
name of Tiberius, raised the standard of revolt in Tuscany
against the emperor. He gained the adhesion of certain
towns, such as Barberano, Bieda and Luna, an old
Etruscan city in the territory of Bieda or Blera. The
exarch was alarmed; but encouraged by the Pope, and
aided by a body of troops, with which Gregory furnished
him, Eutychius slew Petasius and sent his head to Con-
stantinople. “Even with this, the emperor did not look
upon the Romans with favour,’ concludes the Lider
Pontificalis. The popes were loyal to a fault.

Paes IER
* This and the following paragraph, almost verbatim from the Z. P.,
z.e., of course as far as the narrative is concerned,

ST. GREGORY IL 199

It may be well to remark again that the order of
events, as set forth above, is at best but conjectural.
All that can be said for it is that it has been arranged
after a very careful study of the original sources, and of
many eminent modern authorities. As far as its author
can see, the chronological sequence that he has given
above, if it rests on some suppositions, does not contradict
anything the most reliable of the ancients have told us,
and has the merit of not arbitrarily altering the order in
which the Book of the Popes (our best authority) has
related the incidents of Gregory’s life, and is in general
accord with the views of some of the best modern
authorities. Much would be done towards settling the
chronological and other difficulties of Gregory’s pontifi-
cate if only the date of the capture of Ravenna could
be definitely fixed. But, unless some fresh documents are
brought to light, it does not seem possible to determine
the said date with certainty. No doubt, what with the
emperor and his exarch being more intent on forcing
heresy on their Italian subjects than in resisting the
Lombards; what with the Pope having to resist the
Lombards with physical force, and the emperor with
moral; and what with the Lombards now apparently
favouring and now opposing both the emperor and the
Pope, and now acting in unison and now at variance
one with the other, no doubt some of the historians
themselves of those times were as much in the dark as
we are as to the true state of things.

In the account of the beginnings of Iconoclasm given
above, nothing has been said of what the Greek historians
unanimously relate as to the excommunication of the
emperor by the Pope. Theophanes,' eg., after assuring
us that in consequence of Leo’s Iconoclasm Gregory

1 Ad ann. 717, 721

200 ST. GREGORY II.

prevented Italy and Rome from paying taxes, twice
asserts that the Pope “separated Rome and Italy and
the whole of the West from political and ecclesiastical
obedience to Leo and from his Empire.” But the testi-
mony of /azer ill-informed Greeks is not to be compared
with the opposite evidence of the contemporary Liber
Pontificalis, and the Lombard, Paul the Deacon. The
later Latins, who have mentioned these stories, have
copied them from Theophanes. And it is very clear
that the idea of Gregory excommunicating the emperor
has been drawn from that passage in the Pope’s second
letter, where Gregory, quoting St. Paul (1 Cor. v. 5),
prays that for the salvation ot his soul God will send
the emperor a demon. The Pope’s resisting the imposi-
tion of the extraordinary tax (the ‘census’ or poll-tax
of the Z. P.), and his opposition to the emperor’s
Iconoclastic decree, have been magnified into his for-
bidding the payment of azy taxes and separating Italy
from political subjection to Leo.t

Hones The day at length came when the storms in which he

Feb. 731. had passed his important and glorious pontificate broke
unheeded over Gregory’s head. His mortal remains were
laid to rest in St. Peter’s, February 11, 731. Both ancient
and fair-minded modern authors join in praising the char-
acter of Gregory. To the Greek Theophanes he was
as illustrious for his deeds as for his learning; to
Hodgkin? he had “much of the true Roman feeling which
had animated his great namesake and predecessor”; and
to Finlay® he “was a man of sound judgment as well as
an able and zealous priest.”

1 Cf. Temporal Power of the Popes, by Gosselin, i. p. 197 (Eng.
trans.).

* Italy, etc., vi. 460. He is commemorated in the Roman Martyr-
ology on February 13.

3 The Byzantine Empire, p. 46.

ST. GREGORY II. 201

And certainly during the trying years of Gregory’s Gregory's
pontificate there was need of a Pope of sound judgment. oe
He was in the midst of keen and grasping foes. There
were Lombard dukes and Lombard kings eager to seize
on Rome or its territory ; and exarchs of Ravenna wishful
to wring from him his faith or his life. The emperor at
Constantinople, who ought to have been his strongest
support, was his worst oppressor. Great must have been
his temptation to throw in his lot with Liutprand or with
his practically independent dukes! But throughout he
displayed loyalty and good sense. He would not favour
an ambitious duke against his king, nor show himself a
rebel against a tyrannical sovereign. He steered a straight
course, and it brought him to harbour with safety and with
profit. He kept faith with Leo whilst all around him were
falling away from their allegiance and were everywhere
choosing ‘dukes’ for themselves. He caused territory to
be restored, and put down those who raised themselves
up against the Isaurian despot. Despite of this, Gregory
became in practice ruler of the Duchy of Rome. Virtue, in
his case, proved its own reward. The exarch could not
break through the ring of friends who surrounded Rome
and the popes. Liutprand would only restore what he
had seized to ‘ Blessed Peter.’ Before the close of his
reign, then, Gregory, without failing in loyalty, but by
the force of circumstances—the oppressive taxation and
meddling theology of Leo the Isaurian— became the
sovereign power in Rome.

In the midst of all his difficulties, Gregory found time to Decree
devote to church repairs and endowments, as we have tee
noticed before, and to attend to the Church’s liturgy. He
decreed that in Lent, on the Thursdays the fast should
be observed as on the rest of the days of the week, and
that Mass should be said publicly in the churches, though

202 ST. GREGORY II.

these things were not wont to be done before,’ because
Thursdays used to be specially honoured by the Pagans
in their worship of Jupiter. But Walfrid Strabo (+849),
in his work, De adivinis offictis (c.20), says that even
before the time of Gregory II. Mass was celebrated on the
Thursdays in Lent, but that Gregory appointed proper
offices for those days, for before his time the Mass of the
Sunday immediately preceding was wont to be used on
the said Thursdays. Cardinal Bona*® would reconcile the
two statements by supposing that till Gregory’s decree
there was no assembly of the faithful on the Thursdays.

Gregory is commemorated as a saint in the Roman
calendar and martyrology on February 13th. Some mar-
tyrologies give his feast on the 11th February.

17. P. Cf. Pagi, B. Gest., in vit., § 41, from whom this paragraph /
is taken. Pope Melchiades had forbidden the faithful to fast on
Sundays or Thursdays, because the pagans fasted on those days. Cf
L. P., in vit. Melch. And in this connection we find ‘certain
Catholics’ condemned by the 15th canon of the council of Narbonne,
held in 589, for celebrating Thursday in honour of ‘Jupiter, as though
that day were consecrated to him.

2 De Rebus Liturgicis, i. c. 18 n. 2. Duchesne (Z. P,, i. 412)
notes that in the Gregorian Sacramentary, stational Masses are set
down for Thursdays as well as for the other days; whereas in the
Gelasian they are set down for the other days in Lent, but not for the
Thursdays,

CG REG ©. Ray ihe

A.D. 731-741.
Ee ig Se

Sources.—The ‘life’? in the Z. P. is not nearly so important as
that of Gregory II. A great portion of it is taken up with lists of
gifts to and repairs of churches. The other sources are much
the same as for Gregory II. In the ‘life’ of Pope Zachary in the
L. P., there is some material for the last few years of Gregory III.
In this biography, and in many a subsequent one, there will be
frequently quoted the famous Codex Carolinus. ‘The Caroline
Code, so called because it was drawn up by the order of
Charlemagne, consists of ninety-nine letters of Gregory IIL,
Zachary, Stephen (II.) III., Paul I., Stephen (III.) IV., Hadrian
I., and the anti-pope Constantine. Originally written on papyrus,
like the other papal letters of this period, these letters of the
popes to Charles Martel, Pippin or Charlemagne, were by the
orders of the last named copied with the greatest care and
exactness (svmmo cum certamine), “in order,” as the preamble of
the code has it, ‘that no testimony which might benefit Holy
Church might be wanting to his successors.” As they are found
in the C. Code, the letters are undated and apparently not even
arranged in chronological sequence. Hence the dates assigned
to them are more or less conjectural. What data there are in
them which can be used for chronological purposes have been
well set forth by Jaffé and Gundlach (p. 471), in their editions of
the C. C. The only MS. at all ancient of this valuable
document is in the imperial library at Vienna. It was written
out at the end of the ninth century, and belonged to Willibert,
Archbishop of Cologne (870-889). The C. C. has been edited
several times. One of the better and more recent editions, that

Gregory
Pope, 731.

The Pope
sends ad-
monitory
letters to
Leo, 731.

204. GREGORY III.

of Cenni, has been reproduced by Migne, P. Z., t. 98. The best
two editions are those of Jaffé (who closely examined the Vienna
MS. himself), Monumenta Carolina (Berlin, 1867), and of
Gundlach, ap. JZ. G. £/#., iii. For further information on the
C. C., read the introductions of the two last-named authors.

Modern works.—The Power of the Pope during the Middle Ages,
by M. Gosselin, Eng. trans. i. p. 197 sege; Bartolini, S.
Zaccaria Papa, p. xiii. f.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Leo III. 716-741. Liutprand, 712~744. Eutychius, 727-752 ;

apparently the last

of the exarchs.
GREGORY, the son of the very distinctive ‘John, a Syrian,
and known to the Romans as Gregory the Younger?! the
Second, was elected Pope (February 11, 731) by popular
acclamation. He was following in the funeral procession
of his saintly predecessor, when, “moved by divine
inspiration,’ ? the whole body of the people uprose, carried
him off, and elected him Pope. For some cause he was
not consecrated till March 18. For Avzastastus, in the
life of Gregory II., says that after his (Gregory II.’s) death
the see was vacant for thirty-five days.

As the bitterness of Leo? against the upholders of

‘image worship’ was steadily increasing, the first thing
that the Pope did was to address him letters of re-

1 “Qui et vulgarica Romanorum lingua dicitur junior secundus.” Cf,
Willibald, Vzt. S. Bonif., c. 5, with c. 7, ed. Jaffé, pp. 26, 37.

caw Oe Jieh

3 “Fa persecutione grassante, quee per ipsos (Leo and his son
Constantine), mota est ad... . destructionem sacrarum imaginum,”

elena

GREGORY III. 205

monstrance, as Gregory II. had done. These letters were
entrusted to a priest named George, whose name appears
in connection with the Roman Council of 721. But being
a man rather wanting in courage, he returned to Rome
without having dared to present them to the emperor.
Great was the indignation of the Pope when George
returned to him the undelivered letters, and he would
have degraded him from his sacred office.

However, at the intercession of the nobility and of the First synoe
fathers of a council which the Pope had called to consider oe
this matter, George was simply subjected to a suitable lL, 731.
penance and again sent with the letters to Constantinople.

But he was not allowed to get there. He was seized by
the emperor’s orders in Sicily and sent into banishment.

Hereupon Gregory took stronger measures. He oe
summoned! a council to meet in Rome on November 1,

731. Ninety-three bishops took part in the synod held at
the tomb or confession of St. Peter. The whole of the
Roman clergy were also present at the synod, as also the
‘noble consuls’ and the people. It was decreed, in accord-
ance with the decrees of previous popes and the belief of
antiquity, that “if anyone,’ for the future, shall take away,
destroy, or dishonour the images of Our Lord God and
Saviour Jesus Christ, of His Mother, the immaculate and
glorious Virgin Mary, or of the Saints, he shall be excluded
from the body and blood of Our Lord and the unity of the

1 Cf, ep. ad Anton. episc. Grad., ap. Mansi, xii. p. 299; and Chron.
Gradense, ap. Pertz, M7. G. H., vii.; where we read of Antoninus,
patriarch of Grado, and John Archbp. of Ravenna, being summoned to
the council.

2 “Si quis... . adversus eandem venerationem sacrarum imaginum,
videlicet Dei et Dom. nost. J. Christi, et Genitricis ejus semper virginis
immaculate, atque gloriose Marie .... et omnium sanctorum
depositor . . . . et prophanator extiterit, sit extorris a Corpore et
Sanguine D. N. J. Christi vel totius Ecclesiz unitate.” Z. P., from
which all this paragraph is taken.

Violence of

Leo, 732.

206 GREGORY III.

Church.” Another letter was sent to Leo by the Defensor
Constantine; and deputies from different parts of Italy
were also despatched with letters to the emperor praying
for the restoration of holy images. All these messengers
shared the same fate. They were all detained in Sicily,
then robbed of their letters and sent back loaded with
injuries. The Pope even made a fourth attempt to get
letters to the emperors (for Constantine Copronymus was
now a partner in the imperial throne with his father) and
to the ‘intruder’ in the patriarchal throne, Anastasius.

To these appeals on the part of the Pope to moral force,
Leo had recourse to the tyrant’s assistant, brute force.
He determined to punish the Pope and his refractory
subjects (?) in Italy directly and indirectly. About the
year 732, a fleet was despatched to Italy to enforce the
imperial will. It was shipwrecked in the Adriatic. The
taxes of the people of Calabria and Sicily, over whom the
emperor still had power, were considerably increased ; the
‘patrimonies’ of the See of Rome in those parts, which
yielded 34 talents of gold (about 350 lbs.! of gold, or about
£16,000) were confiscated to the imperial exchequer; and
the churches? of those countries as well as those of the

1 Cf. The Power of the Pope, i. p. 118.

2 Theoph., in C/rom., ad an. 724, is our authority for this paragraph.
The authorities for the change of diocese are (1) the famous letter of
Hadrian to Charlemagne, on the subject of the worship of images,
which is printed at the end of the Seventh General Council (ap. Mansi,
xiii. 759, beginning with ‘Dominus ac Redemptor’). At the end of
this long letter, or rather treatise, Hadrian says he has written about
the restitution of the diocese of Illyricum, “que tunc cum patrimoniis
nostris abstulerunt, quando sacras imagines deposuerunt” ; and (2) the
close of the first letter (‘ Principatum itaque,’ ap. Mansi, xv. 162f.) of
Pope Nicholas to the emperor Michael. There Nicholas asks that his
authority be restored over the places mentioned in the text ; and he
prays further: “Praterea Calabritanum patrimonium et Siculum,
quzeque nostra Ecclesize concessa fuerunt, et ea possidenda obtinuit,
et disponendo per familiares suos regere studuit, vestris concessionibus

GREGORY III. 207

great prefecture of Illyricum he transferred to the juris-
diction of the patriarch of Constantinople. This prefecture
comprised the Old and New Epirus, Illyricum, Macedonia,
Thessaly, Achaia, Dacia, Ripensis and Mediterranea, Mcesia,
Dardania and Prevalis, with its metropolis Scodra. By
this last measure of Leo the patriarchate of Constantinople
became coterminous with the limits of the Eastern Empire,
and the foundations of the coming schism between the
Eastern and Western Churches were deepened. For the or-
thodox patriarchs were afterwards unwilling to give up their
jurisdiction + over the provinces of Illyricum,’ even though
acquired in such a scandalous manner. Professor Bury
supposes, not without reason, that these changes were the
more easily effected by Leo inasmuch as South Italy had
become largely Greek by the number of the orthodox who
had fled thither from his persecuting arm. The number of
orthodox Greeks, he says, priests, monks and laymen, who
escaped from the East to South Italy in the reigns of Leo
and Constantine has been set at 50,000. And, of course,
Leo did not attempt to enforce his Iconoclastic edicts
there.

reddantur.” Pope Stephen (II.) III., in a letter (757) to Pippin (ap.

Cod. Carol. 11, ed. JZ. G. Epp. iii.) prays him to bring about the restora-

tion of the Calabrian, etc., patrimony. “ Postulamus....ut....ita

disponere jubeas de parte Greecorum, ut... . Ecclesia... . omnia

proprietatis sue percipiat.” These patrimonies were only recovered |
by the Roman Church, under Nicholas II. (1059), when the Greeks

and Saracens had been expelled from those parts by the Normans.

(Cf. Brunengo, Orig. del domin. temp., P. 61.)

1 Even in our own days the schismatical Greeks upbraided the
clergy of Constantinople with this usurpation, when the latter urged
their jurisdiction over the dioceses of Greece. “That is,” as the
archimandrite Pharmacides, Professor of Theology at the University of
Athens, retorted in a reply he made to the clergy of Constantinople on
this pretended jurisdiction, “an heretical emperor took these dioceses
from an orthodox Pope to give them to a Patriarch as heretical as
himself” (Pharmacides, Améitomos, Athens, 1850). C7 Pitzipios,
L’Eglise Orient., P.i. p. 12.

Gregory
repairs and
beautifies
churches.

208 GREGORY IIt.

Leo’s attempts to cut off the Pope’s supplies were not so
successful in the Duchy of Naples. There Duke Theodore,
the successor of Exhilaratus, was known to be well disposed
towards the Pope. Accordingly, the emperor sent one of
his secretaries, by name Alfanus, to Naples with strict
orders to charge Theodore not to render any kind of service
to the Pope, but, on the contrary, to hinder the despatch to
Gregory of the revenues due to him from property belong-
ing to the Holy See in the Duchy. But to these tyrannical
orders Theodore? turned a deaf ear, and the papal patri-
monies in Naples remained safe. Unfortunately the
authority for this action by Duke Theodore rests, it seems,
solely on a work edited by Pratilli; and the work in
question was one of those productions which Pratilli
invented as well as published.

For a year or two after the events above narrated,
Gregory seems to have enjoyed an interval of repose from
the vexations of external foes, whether the Lombards or
the Iconoclast emperors. He employed the interval in
making a practical protest against the conduct of Leo,
by showing as much honour to images and relics as the
emperor was showing disrespect. The Book of the Popes
gives us a long list: of churches which Gregory built,
repaired or beautified. Among his other works, he built
a beautiful oratory in St. Peter’s, in which he placed a
large number of the relics? of the saints. This oratory
(known later as Sancta Maria in Cancellis) stood where
now stands, in St. Peter’s, the altar of the Transfiguration.
Renewed in 1149 by Eugenius III., it was finally demolished
in 1507, when the ground was cleared for the present

1 La Cronaca di Napoli, ap. Pratilli, t. iii, p. 31, cited by
Bartolini, p. xlvii.

2, P. “In quo recondidit in honorem Salvatoris, Sancteeque ejus

Genitricis, reliquias SS. App., vel omnium SS. Martyrum ac Con-
fessorum,” etc.

GREGORY II. 209

stupendous pile of St. Peter’s on the Vatican. This
oratory is more interesting to us now from the liturgical
history connected with it.

In a third synod at Rome, held by the Pope, it was
decreed that the monks of the three monasteries, whose
duty it was to sing the divine office in St. Peter’s, should
recite part of the office in this oratory. Proper prayers
were also prescribed for the Mass to be said in this oratory,
and Gregory even added a few words to the canon of
the Mass, only, however, to be used in the Mass said in
this oratory ;1 because the canon of the Mass had never
been touched from the time of St. Gregory I., and it
was thought to be against apostolical tradition to tamper
with it.

The acts of this synod, the zezwdly prescribed prayers,
etc., were by Gregory’s order engraved on marble tablets,
and placed in the oratory itself? These tablets were
transcribed by the celebrated collector of epigraphs, Pietro
Sabino, a Roman antiquary of the fifteenth century, on
the occasion of their discovery, when, by order of Cardinal
Cibo, nephew of Innocent VIII., there was being built
in this oratory a shrine for the ‘Holy Lance. Many
fragments of these tablets are still in existence in the
crypt of the Vatican. That prince of archeologists,
De Rossi,*? with their aid, and that of the transcripts of

1 The words were: “Quorum solemnitas hodie in conspectu tuze
majestatis celebratur, quorum meritis precibusque concedas.” Cf
L. P., and Walfrid Strabo, De divin. offic., c. 22.

2 “ Quam institutionem in eodem oratorio tabulis lapideis conscribere
fecit.” Z.P. It was from such tablets that the authors of the Lzder
Pontificalis gathered much of their information.

3 “Due monument. ined. spettanti a due Conc. Rom. dei s. viii. ed
xi.,” cited by Bartolini (p. xlix), from whom the above is taken. This
document is also given in full by Duchesne (Z. P., i. 422, 3). The
document states in two places that the synod was held in the 15th
Indiction, or 732. With this inscription, compare the liturgical service

VOL, 1) PT..1, 14

Third
synod at
Rome,
732

210 GREGORY IiIt.

Sabino, has perfectly restored the reading of this pro-
foundly interesting memorial of an otherwise unknown
synod of Gregory III.

Presentof Still further to decorate St. Peter’s, Gregory made use of

the exarch F 5

Eutychius, a present sent him by the exarch, who, since his recon-
ciliation with Gregory II., remained true to the Holy See.
The gift consisted of six beautiful spiral columns of onyx
marble, and as Bartolini,1 whom we are here closely follow-
ing, observes, Gregory determined so to place them that
the very sight of them would serve as a protest against the
Iconoclasm of the Greek emperors. In the Greek churches,
the ‘ Holy Place, or Sanctuary, is separated from the rest
of the church by a screen that stretches right across, made
of pilasters that support a cornice, on which are placed the
candelabra. The spaces between the little pillars are
taken up with images of the saints. Hence this partition
is known as the ‘iconostasis, or place of the images.
Gregory made a similar use of the exarch’s present. In
front of the already existing columns round the ‘confession’
of St. Peter, the Pope erected the six onyx marble pillars,
and between them placed images of Our Lord, Our Lady,
and the saints. A beam, covered with plates of pure
silver, rested on the columns, and on it was placed some
open ornamental work, in the midst of which appeared
lamps of pure silver. From these lamps? this architrave
was known as the ‘lamp-beam’ (¢rabes Jlampadaria).
There does not seem any further call to enumerate the
‘church work’ of Pope Gregory. Suffice it to add that he

appointed by Gregory III. for St. Paul’s, without the walls, as made
known to us by another inscription. Ap, Grisar, Analecta Rom., i. 168.+
relent bs
22.P. Cf. Bartolini, whose account will correct that of Gregorovius.
Duchesne (LZ. P., i. 422) notes that in one of his frescoes, in the Hall
of Constantine in the Vatican, Raphael has depicted this piece of
decorative work,

GREGORY III. 211

founded monasteries (in one of which—St. Chrysogonus—
the future Pope Stephen (III.) IV. was brought up), and
rebuilt the hospice of SS. Sergius and Bacchus,! near St.
Peter’s, and endowed it for the support of the poor for ever ;
and that he decreed that the wine, candles, etc., to be used
at the Mass to be said at the cemeteries on the feast days
of their various patron saints were to be taken from the
Lateran palace by the ‘ oblationarius,’? viz., the subdeacon
or deacon whose business it was to take the ‘oblata’ (the
wine, etc.) for the officiating priest and offer or present
them to the archdeacon.

Besides building and decorating churches, various affairs aan Lone
of importance occupied Gregory’s attention during this re
interval of rest which the Greeks and the Lombards allowed quarrel
him. At the exhortation, as we have seen, of Gregory IL, Ba
the bishops and people of Venetia and Istria had elected
Antoninus, as successor of Donatus, to the patriarchate
of Grado. Gregory III. (?) sent him the pallium, and at
the Roman synod of November 731 it was decided that
the bishop of Grado should be primate of the whole of
Venetia and Istria, and that Serenus of Aquileia must be
content with Cormones, where he was then residing.®
But later on we find Calistus, the successor of Serenus,
standing in need of the same rebuke for trespassing on
the jurisdiction of the See of Grado that Gregory II. had
had to address to Serenus. Callistus* had to be called to

1 “Diaconiam SS. Sergii et Bacchi a fundamentis ampliori fabrica
dilatavit. Et concedens omnia, que in usum Diaconiz existunt,
statuit perpetuo tempore pro sustentatione pauperum in Wiaconiz
ministerio deservire,” 20.

RLF:

3 Johannis, Chron. Grad., ap. Pertz., MZ. G. SS., vii. pp. 46-7. Cf
Paul., Hist. Langob., vi. 51.

4 Dand., Chron., ap. Muratori, R. Z S., xii., and Jaffé, 2240 (1725).
Some time after this we find that the Pope had to exhort, ‘with
apostolic vigour, Antoninus to pay the required visit ‘ad limina.” The

212 GREGORY III.

Gregory
and Eng-
land. (rz)
Egbert of
York,

(2) Tatwine
and Noth-
elm of
Canterbury
receive the
pall,

order for trying to obtain possession of certain property
in the island of Barbiana that belonged to the See of
Grado.

Gregory was also busy with the affairs of the English
Church. By the decree of his great namesake, Gregory I.,
there were to have been two archbishoprics in England,
one at York and one at Canterbury; but after St. Paulinus
had had to abandon York, there had only been one arch-
bishop in England. Now, however, Egbert, Bishop of
York, backed by Ceolwulf, King of Northumbria, a relative
of his, claimed metropolitical rights for York. Being a
man of considerable energy and determination, as well as
learning, and “realising that while it is a mark of pride
to seek what is not one’s due, it is a sign of listlessness
not to look after one’s rights,” he never rested till he
obtained the pallium from the Pope. This, according to
the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, he received in the year 735.

To two archbishops of Canterbury is it recorded that
Gregory III. gave the pallium. Tatwine, elected arch-
bishop in 731, went to Rome to ask for the pall. The
Pope, as we learn from his own letter? to the bishops of

archbishop was constantly pleading that political disturbances were
always arising that made it unsafe for him to go to Rome. Con-
sequently Gregory had to fix a definite time for him to come. Cf
Jaffé, 2256, quoting a document brought to light by Pertz, and printed
also WM. G. EPp., ili. p. 708.

1 “Animosioris ingenii cogitans quod sicut superbum est si appetas
indebita, ita ignavum si debita negligas.” Will. Malms., De Ges¢. Reg.,
1.1, ed. Migne, p. 1019 ; Malms. repeats the same, De Gest. Pont., 1.
il, 20 p.1571. Cf. Anglo-Sax. Chron., ad an. 735; Lingard, A.-S.
Church, 1. p. 72.

2 Ap. Malms., De Gest. Pont. i, ed. Migne, p. 1469. “Virum
religionis et magne probitatis, sub ipso tempore, quo apud nos stetit,
eum cognovimus. Proinde auditis ejus petitionibus antecessorum ejus
jura dignitatis perquiri in sacro scrinio fecimus, et invenientes eum
justa postulasse, sacrum pallium .. . . apostolica auctoritate ei
tradidimus.” . . . . “Cui vices nostras per omnia gerendas in regione
illa commisimus.” Cf. sup., Pt. 1., pp. 272, 298, etc.

GREGORY IIL 243

England, pleased with the character of the man, still took
good care to look up the rights of the See of Canterbury
before conferring the pall. Finding that Tatwine was
only asking for his dues, the Pope gave him the pall and
all the privileges that St. Gregory I. had given to St.
Augustine, subjecting to him all the bishops of Britain,
and making him his vicar. On the death of Tatwine,
“this year! (736) archbishop Nothelm received his pall
from the bishop of the Romans.”

Transition from the affairs of England to Boniface, the (3) St.

greatest Englishman of his age, is easy. We left him *%
in receipt of the solution of various difficulties about
which he had consulted St. Gregory I]. With the most
marked success he continued his labours in Hesse and
Thuringia. Thousands were baptised. And again, about
the year 732, messengers from Boniface appeared in Rome
to inform the Pope of the progress of the Church in
Germany. After telling Gregory of the kindly relations
that existed between his predecessor and their master,
they proceeded, in accordance with their instructions, to
declare that Boniface wished to profess his humble sub-

jection to the Holy See for the time to come, and to beg

that he might be allowed to remain on the same intimate
terms with Gregory III. as he had with his namesake?
To these requests the Pope returned a most gracious
consent both by word of mouth and by letter*; and sent

1 Anglo-Sax. Chron., ad an. 736. Archbishop Cuthbert received
the pall in 740 (Rog. Wend., i. 227).

2 Sup.5 Dp. 162.

3 All this from Willibald’s Zz/e, c. 6, p. 35. “Sed et devotam ejus
in futurum humilitatis apostolicee sedi subjectionem narraverunt et,
ut familiaritati ac communioni sancti pontificis atque totius sedis
apostolicee ex hoc devote subjectus communicaret, quemadmodum
edocti erant, precabantur.”

4M. G. Epp,., iii., and Bib. Rer. Germ., iii. p. 91, ep. 28. In this
letter Gregory solves difficulties proposed by Boniface, and, among

oniface,

214 GREGORY III.

his messengers back to St. Boniface with the archi-
episcopal pallium and with various presents and relics.

St. Boniface Cheered by the Pope’s encouraging words, ‘the German

tied vst exile, Boniface,! continued his glorious work, again labour-

about 737, ing in Bavaria. Once more to enjoy ‘the life-giving con-
versation’? of the apostolic Father, and as he felt old age
creeping on, to commend himself to the prayers of the
saints, Boniface, with a numerous company of his disciples,
went (¢. 737) to Rome for the third time. He was not only
most kindly received by the Pope,? but during a stay at
Rome of over a year, not only the Romans flocked to
hear him, but pilgrims of various nations, Anglo-Saxons,
Bavarians, etc. What, among other things, helped to keep
him so long at Rome was his having to wait for a synod
which the Pope was about to hold, as Boniface himself in-
forms us. Whether the said synod was ever held we know
not, for it could not have been the third synod of which we
have just spoken.> However that may be, Boniface returned
to his work, loaded as before with presents and relics. This
time he made straight (739) for Bavaria, bearing with him
various commendatory letters. One® commends Boniface
to all the bishops and principal ecclesiastics of Germany,
urging them to give him what helpers they could. A
second’ was addressed by the Pope to the nobles and peoples

other things, commands him not to tolerate for the future the eating
of horse flesh, whether of the ‘ wild or domestic’ animal.

1 The abbess Eadburga, “exulem Germanicum spiritali lumine
consolata est,” ep. 30.

2 “Romam venit, ut apostolici patris salubri frueretur conloquio,
et sanctorum se, jam ztate provectus, orationibus commendaret,”
Willib., Vita, c. 7.

3 76. Cf. Ep. 41 Bonif., ed. 17. G. H.; or ep. 34, ed. Bzd. Rer. Germ.

4 Ep., Zc. Dated in Gundlach’s and in Jaffé’s edd., c. 737-8.

Sup., p. 209.

png. G. 77.3127 ed, S.

Ep. 43, 4. G. H.; 128 S. Cf Conversion of the Teutonic Race,
Ie onal 2 eee

ek = So a

GREGORY II, 218

of all Germany, to the Thuringians, Hessians, Borthari (a
people on’the Bordaa or Wohra), Nistresi (a people on the
Nister, a branch of the Sieg), Wedrecii (a people on the
Wetter), etc, and was an exhortation to them to obey
Boniface, to eschew all manner of sorcery and witchcraft,
and to serve God. Finally! the bishops in Alemannia and
Bavaria were reminded that for the good of the people they
ought to receive and listen to Boniface, as his (the Pope’s)
vicar, renounce all paganism and heresy, and assemble in
council twice a year—by the’ Danube, at Augsburg, or
wherever Boniface may appoint the required synods to be
held. With the co-operation of Odilo, the reigning duke,
Boniface set vigorously to work to consolidate Christianity
in Bavaria. False bishops and priests had to be disposed of
—as well those who had been invalidly ordained as those
who were untrue to their sacred character—and a new
hierarchy established. To this end he (739) divided?
Bavaria into four provinces, placing a bishop over each.
In a letter? dated IV. Kal. Novemb., 8th indiction
(October 29, 739), Boniface received a letter from the
Pope congratulating him on the thousands of men that,
with the help of Charles Martel (whom Gregory calls
‘Prince of the Franks’), he had brought into the fold of
Christ ; approves of what he has arranged in Bavaria ;
exhorts him to go on teaching them “the holy Catholic
and Apostolic tradition of the Roman Church,” orders the
reordination of those doubtfully ordained, bids him hold in
his (the Pope’s) stead a synod by the banks of the Danube,
and rather go about from place to place than remain in one
spot. For the present we will leave Boniface toiling for

1 Ep. 44, WG. H.; 129 ed. S. “Nostram agentem VICEM Js nerele
“ apostolica auctoritate a nobis destinatus est.”

2 Will, Vt, c. 7.

? Ep. 450, 7. G. H.; 130 ed. S.

Gregory
repairs the
walls of
Rome,

Liutprand
in arms
against
the Duchy
of Rome,
739:

216 GREGORY III.

his heavenly Master in Bavaria, which he did not leave to
return to Hesse and Thuringia till the end of the year 740.
We must now turn again to the ‘eternal Lombard
question’ which troubled the last years of Gregory’s life.
Conscious that the ambition of Liutprand was not dead
but sleeping, Gregory completed, at his own cost,! the
restoration of the walls of Rome, taken in hand by his pre-
decessors. He also renewed in a very strong manner the
fortifications of Centumcellz (Civita Vecchia), For a price,
Gregory recovered from Transamund (or Trasimund), Duke
of Spoleto, Gallese, a strong place on the Flaminian Way,
which the Lombards had seized, and which the Romans
had never ceased trying to retake, for it commanded their
road of communication with Ravenna. “It is clear that?
he (the Pope) behaved as ruler in the Roman duchy.”
Returned, flushed with victory, into Italy from Provence,
whither, at the urgent call of Charles Martel, he had gone
(737) to help that prince against the Saracens,> Liutprand
again took up his ambitious views for the subjugation of
the whole of Italy. Incursions were at once (Spring 739)
made into whatever remnant of the exarchate‘ still
remained in the power of the exarch; and the dukes of
Spoleto and Beneventum were called upon to ravage
the Duchy of Rome. This they refused to do, giving
as their reason “that they had® a treaty with the Roman

ATEN Ps

2 Gregorovius, Azs¢. of Rome, ii. p. 246.

* Various chronicles, Ann. Laméacences (ap. Pertz, M. G. H., i.),
etc., mention this campaign : “ Carlus bellum habuit contra Sarracenos,”
ad an. 737.

* Ep. 2 (ed. Gundlach), Greg. III. of the Codex Carolinus, where
Gregory complains of the wholesale destruction of church property
(in 739) by the Lombards in the Ravennese district.

5 Jd. “Dicentes ipsi duces, quia contra Ecclesiam sanctam Dei,
ejusque populum Zeculiarem non exercitamus, quoniam et pactum
cum eis habemus, et ex ipsa Ecclesia fidem accepimus.”

GREGORY III. Oty.

people and had received their faith from the Roman
Church.” This action on the part of the dukes gave
occasion to Paul the Deacon! to write that Transamund
of Spoleto rebelled against Liutprand, and has given,
we may presume, what ground they have to certain
moderns of accusing Gregory of unfair intrigues with
the Lombard dukes. But if the treaty (factum) spoken
of above were a league—even offensive and defensive—
between Gregory and the dukes of Spoleto and Beneven-
tum, the Pope is not to be blamed. He had a perfect
right to try and strengthen himself against the ambitious
Liutprand. No doubt the Lombard dukes had other
motives for their action than those which they put forth.
Likely enough they threw in their lot with the Pope
to get support against Liutprand, whom they were as
little anxious to have too powerful as the Pope himself.
But we may be sure that Gregory’s version of the affair
is the true one, viz., that Liutprand did not take up
arms to quell a rebellion of insurgent dukes aided by
the Pope, but that the dukes were attacked because
they refused to carry out the instructions of their king.
The resistance of the dukes was passive, not active. Had
not this been the truth of the matter, Gregory would
not with such confidence have declared that the stories
told to Charles against the dukes were untrue, and have
begged him to send an incorruptible mzssus to enquire
into the whole case.2, However all this may be, Liutprand

Tie N05 5:

2 “Omnia enim false tibi suggerunt (the Kings, Liutprand and his
nephew Hildeprand) .... quod quasi aliquam culpam commissam
habeant eis eorum duces. ... Nam ipsi.... parati fuerunt et sunt
secundum antiquam consuetudinem eis hobedire.... Tamen ut rei
veritas vobis declaretur .... jubeas... . tuum fidelissimum missum,
qui non premiis corrumpatur, dirigere ut... . tue bonitati omnia

pandantur,” Ep. 2.

Gregory
appeals to
Charles
Martel,

739+

218 GREGORY III.

was soon on the march for Spoleto. Transamund fled
to Rome, and was kindly received by the Pope.?

Nothing could stop the march of the warlike Liutprand.
By June 739 Spoleto was in his hands, and one of his
followers was named duke in place of Transamund.
His troops were soon in the territory of the Romans.
Not knowing which way to turn for help in this
emergency, Gregory followed? the example of his pre-
decessor and appealed to Charles Martel for help. The
embassy, which he despatched to the powerful Frankish
Major-domo, and of which the chief members were
Anastasius, a bishop, and Sergius, a priest, to avoid falling
into the hands of the Lombards, went by sea. They
were the bearers of a letter, which has perished, many
presents, and the keys of the ‘confession’ of St. Peter.
Acting in concert with the Pope were the Roman nobility
(principes Romanorum), whose resolutions (decreta), to
the effect that they wished to place themselves under
the protection of Charles, and give up all dependence on
the emperor, were also taken by the ambassadors along
with the Pope’s letter2 The embassy was received with

a LZ. P. in vit. Zach. ;

2 L. P. in vit. Steph. (II.) ITI.

8 The names of the legates, etc., are found in the Z. P. in vit.; the
decrees of the Roman ‘princes’ are spoken of in the Chron. Mozssiac.,
ap. Pertz, 7. G. SS.,i., otherwise known as the Avmnales Vet. Franc.,
ap. Migne, P. L., t. 98; and in the continuator of Fredegarius, c. 110
(ap. Bouquet, Recueil des hist. des Gaules, ii.), who speaks of the
Romanum consultum, not consulatum, as it appears in some editions
by mistake. C/ Jungmann, Diss., xiv. § 25. Apart from his dealings
with Charles Martel, the only other recorded connection of Gregory
III. with Gaul or France (partes Francie) is his sending the pall to
Vulcarius and making him archbishop of Vienne (Z. P. in vit. Greg.
III.)—a fact evidently unknown to Mr Kellet in his Pofe Gregory the
Great and his relations with Gaul (Cambridge Hist. Essays, No. II.).
This writer, in an appendix to the above essay, entitled 4 sketch of the
relations of the Franks with the Papacy from 604-800, draws a

GREGORY III. 219

all honour by Charles, and sent back to Rome, we are
told,! ‘with great presents,’ but without any promise of
assistance. Continued success meanwhile was attending
the arms of Liutprand. Four of the border towns of the
Roman duchy fell into his hands—Ameria (Amelia), Ortas
(Orte), Polimartium (Bomarzo), and Blera (Bieda)%—and
his tents and standards were to be seen from the walls
of Rome dotted over the Neronian plain. Once more
was the unhappy Campagna laid waste, and, as a mark
of their dependence, many Roman nobles were forced
to wear their hair and dress in the Lombard fashion.’
In despair the Pope sent again for help to Charles. For
Transamund, neither he nor the Romans would give up,
and Liutprand was resolved to get him into his hands.4
“Our affliction,” he writes to the subregulus, as he called
Charles, “moves us to write to you once again, trusting
that you are a loving son of St. Peter and of us, and
that, from respect for him, you will come and defend
the Church of God and His ‘peculiar people, who are
now unable to endure the persecution and oppression of
the Lombards. They have seized the very means set
aside to furnish funds for the lights ever kept burning

number of most erroneous conclusions, not only from non-existing
documents, but also from his own want of knowledge.

1 Ann. Moissiac., 20.

2“ Ab eodem rege (Liutprand) abstulte sunt a ducatu Romano
civitates IIII. . . . et sic isdem rex ad suum palatium est reversus per
mensem augustum,” indictione vii. Z. P. in. vit. Zach., § 207. So in his
letter of Oct. 15, 740, to the bishops of Tuscany (ap. 7. G. Ep, iii.
478 n.), Gregory speaks of the four towns “quae anno preterito b. Petro
ablata sunt.”

3 7. P. For this Lombard method of wearing the hair, etc. of
Paulus, H. L., iv. 22; Hodgkin, /¢aly, v. 154.

4 “Dum a predecessore ejus (Pope Zachary) b. memorize Gregorio,
atque ab Stephano quodam patricio et duce, vel omni exercitu
Romano predictus Trasimundus redditus non fuisset.”... LZ. P.
in vit. Zach., § 207.

Liutprand
withdraws,
Aug. 739:

220 GREGORY III.

at St. Peter’s tomb, and they have carried off offer-
ings that have been made by you and by those who
have gone before you. And because, after. God, we have
turned to you, the Lombards deride and oppress us.
Hence the Church of St. Peter! has been stripped and
reduced to the last straits. We have put into the mouth
of the bearer of this letter, your faithful servant (¢uzs
fidelis), all our woes, which he will be able to unfold to
you.” In conclusion? Gregory begs Charles to come at
once, to show his love towards St. Peter, and ‘us, his
own people’ (eusque—Petri—peculiarem populum).

It was perhaps this letter which caused Charles Martel to
despatch an embassy to Rome. Certain it is, at any rate,
that he sent one. Grimo, abbot of Corbie, and Sigebert, a
monk of St. Denis, brought a letter and presents for the
Pope.? Whether through fear of the Roman fever, or, as
there is reason * to believe, influenced by the arrival of this
deputation, and perhaps by some remonstrance on the part
of Charles Martel, who was doubtless to that extent moved
by the letters of Gregory, Liutprand withdrew® to Pavia
in the August of 739. But he was not prepared to forego
the goal of his ambition without an effort. He, too, sent
an embassy to Charles. The great ‘Mayor of the Palace’

1 From these words, some have erroneously concluded that it was
the actual basilica of St. Peter, and not the property of the Roman
Church in general that had been devastated.

2 pit, ed. G:

8 Ann. Moissiac. 1. c.

4 The reason is that Charlemagne, in his will, regulating the division
of his empire, declared that his grandfather, Charles Martel, had been
a defender of the Church of St. Peter, just as he had himself. “Super
omnia jubemus, ut ipsi tres fratres (Carolus, Pippinus, Ludovicus)
curam et defensionem Ecclesiz S. Petri suscipiant simul, sicut quondam
ab avo nostro Carolo et .... Pipino....et a nobis postea
suscepta est” (Charta de divisione regnorum, § 15). Ap. Boretius,

i. p. 129. Cf. Muratori, Ammal., ad an. 741.
Soe inevit, Zack,

GREGORY III. 221

~ was reminded that Liutprand had adopted or taken under
his special protection Charles’ young son Pippin, and that
Liutprand was his brother-in-law. On the other hand,
every effort was made to impress upon the Frankish
Prince that Liutprand simply wanted to punish rebellious
subjects. Whether or not Charles was convinced, the
envoys of the Lombard returned rejoicing. The Mayor of
the Palace was ill, they said, and would not fight. Again,
then (740), did Liutprand take the field; and again was
Gregory compelled to write? to Charles. “We were
overwhelmed with grief when we saw the little that was
left from last year for the support of the poor of Christ
and the upkeep of the church lamps in the Ravennese
district, laid waste with fire and sword by the kings of
the Lombards. Moreover, to these parts also have they
despatched troops. They have destroyed the farms of
St. Peter, and the cattle which still remained to us they
have carried off. Not only have we not received any help
from you, but, as you have not checked the warlike action
of the kings, it is clear that you have paid more attention
to their version of the affair than you have to ours, true
though it be. The result is that you yourself are even
derided by them: ‘Let Charles and his Franks come and
save you from us if they can.’ By the power given him by
God, St. Peter could defend his own; but he would try
his faithful children.” Charles must not believe what the
Lombard kings urge against the dukes of Spoleto and
Beneventum. “Their only offence is that last year (738)
they refused to make an inroad on us.” ... “For the
dukes were, and are, ready to render them that obedience
which ancient custom requires.” .. . “Still, that you may
know the truth for yourself, send a faithful agent, who

1 For the last three years of his life Charles Martel was out of health.
2 Ep. 2, ed. Gund., ann. 740.

Death of
Gregory
Til.) 74t.

222 GREGORY III.

cannot be bribed, and let him see what we have to suffer,
and then report everything to you.” ... “Prefer not the
friendship of these kings to that of the Prince of the
Apostles. Make haste to help us.” Meanwhile, taking
advantage of the withdrawal (739) of the Lombard king,
Transamund came to an understanding with the Romans,
collected a large army and entered the Duchy of Spoleto
in two directions. He was completely victorious, and
entered Spoleto, December 739 (or 740 ?).. But no sooner
was Transamund once more firmly established in his
position than he proved unfaithful to his benefactors. In
vain Gregory wrote to him “to recover the four? cities
which had been lost for his sake.” Transamund would not
move ; probably he felt it would take him all his time to
prepare to resist Liutprand. Gregory then tried to move
Liutprand himself to restore the cities. He sent to him
the priest Anastasius and the regionary subdeacon
Adeodatus. This we know from a letter? which the Pope
wrote to the bishops of Lombard Tuscany (October 15,
740), reminding them of their consecration oath, by which
they had undertaken to do all they could for the Church
of St. Peter when it was in danger, and exhorting them to
help and co-operate with his ambassadors, so that the four
cities might be restored. “Weak as I am from illness,”
concludes the brave Pope, “if, as I will not believe, you
should refrain from giving your help and going with my
ambassadors, I will undertake the journey myself and save
you from the responsibility of being unfaithful to your
obligations.”

It was all in vain; Liutprand would not listen, but
continued his warlike operations against the exarchate

17. Pvin vit. Zach.
2 Ep. ap. Migne, t. 98 p. 58, and ap. Gundlach, JZ. G. Epp, iii.
p. 478 n.

GREGORY Ill. 223

and the Roman duchy. The shock of battle was not
to be much longer felt by Gregory; but he died! whilst
its din was ringing in his ears. Gregory was buried in
St. Peter’s,2 December 10 (November 29, Jaffé), 741.
It is very unfortunate that, for the pontificates of the two
Gregorys, while events of paramount importance were
taking place, there should be such chronological uncer-
tainty. Those who are of opinion that the capture of
Ravenna effected by Liutprand did not take place under
Gregory II., believe that it occurred at the close of the
reign of his successor. If the conjecture of these writers
is correct, and if it be further the fact that Transamund
recovered possession of Spoleto in December 739, we
have perhaps an explanation of how it was that Liutprand
had not attacked him again in force before the death of
Gregory, at the close of 741. Liutprand would have been
too busy with his designs on Ravenna to attend to his
enemies further south. But, of course, even without
supposing that he seized the imperial capital in Italy at
this time, he may have had to devote such attention to
the exarch that he had not proper time to devote to
punishing the Spoletans. But obviously there is nothing
but conjecture in all this.

After what we have seen of the life of Gregory III., we His
can have little difficulty in endorsing his character as we wer
find it in the pages of the Book of the Popes, and that
even though it is almost a word for word repetition of
the character of Leo II. “He was aman of the greatest
meekness and one truly wise. He was well acquainted

Ty aim vit. Zach,

2 In the oratory to Our Lady, which had been built by him (cf suf.
p. 208). Eugenius III. was buried in the same place, as a verse in his
epitaph notes: “ Tertius hic papa Gregorius est tumulatus ” (Duchesne,
L. P., i. 532). It is on Nov. 28 that Gregory is commemorated in the
Roman martyrology.

Death of
Leo III.
and
Charles
Martel.

224 GREGORY Iit.

with the sacred Scriptures, knowing all the Psalms

by heart, and thoroughly imbued with their meaning.
Skilled both in Latin and Greek, he was a polished and
successful preacher, and a stout upholder of the Catholic
faith, He was a lover both of poverty and the poor, a
protector of the widow and the orphan, and a friend of
monks and nuns (re/igtose volentibus vivere ... . dilector).

A few months before the death of Gregory, first the
emperor Leo III. (June 18) and then Charles Martel
(October 21)1 had also terminated their turbulent careers.
The one was to be followed by a son, Constantine
Copronymus, who was to -be a fiercer enemy of the Church
than his father ; the other by a son, Pippin, who was to be
to it a greater benefactor.

1 According to the Aum. S. Amand., ap. Pertz, M@. G. 7, 1.,ad an.

741, Charles died on the 15th of Oct.: ‘“Karlus dux Francorum
mortuus est Idibus Oct.”

Dalai 4 AG HARRY.

A.D. 741-752.

Sources.—The full and contemporary Zzfe in the Z. P, Letters
of Zachary in the Codex Carolinus, etc.; extracts from his
Registers. Various Chronicles, ap. Pertz, 4. G. AH From
the extant copies it is clear that the practice of drawing up
chronicles or annals began among the Franks at the end of
the seventh, or the beginning of the eighth, century, in connection
with the greater churches or monasteries. Ina short time these
annals were circulated through several monasteries. They con-
sist for the most part of short notices, written down by suc-
cessive unknown but simple scribes. Hence, in the case of
contemporary writers, as men who wrote not for others but
for themselves, for a friend or for their Church, they may be
implicitly relied on. Of course there are errors in the Aznals,
as we xow have them. ‘This from various reasons, ¢g., from
mistakes made in recopying originals that were perhaps
getting the worse for wear; and from the fact that owing to
want of space, events were not assigned to their proper years
with sufficient care. Some of these annals were drawn up not
by the private enterprise of an individual monk, but under the
auspices of the civil authorities—e.g., the Annales Laurissenses
or Laureshamenses (The Annals of Lorsch), from 741-788, The
Annales Bertiniani in France, and /uddenses in Germany, were
continuations of these pubic annals. Though there is not
the slightest reason for supposing that all the early annals were
derived from a common source, it is more than likely that certain
groups of them have a common source, ¢g., the Annales S.
Amandi, Laubacenses and Tiliani. Many of them are to be found
VOL: 1. PY. 0. Is

226 ST. ZACHARY

Zachary
Pope, Dec,
IO, 741.

ap. MG. SS., i. and ii. In xiii. and xiv. this original collection
was enlarged and corrected. In i. we have, e.g., the Chronicon
Motssiacense, a South-Gaulish Chronicle, drawn up at the begin-
ning of the ninth century. These annals have a close affinity, or,
rather, are almost identical with the Annales Veteres Francorum,
ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 98. The Annals of Lorsch (Laurissenses,
otherwise known as Piebeii and Loiseliani) are important. They
run from 741-829, are believed to be the work of three different
compilers, and are, perhaps, in a wide sense, official annals.
Certain annals have, without sufficient reason, been assigned to
the famous Eginhard or Einhard, the secretary and biographer
of Charlemagne. Cf De Smedt, Lntroduc. Gen. ad. H. £., pp.
88-96, from whom much of the above note is taken, and especi-
ally Monod, Etudes critiques sur les sources de Vhist. Caroling.
Paris, 1898. See also Monks of the West, vi. pp. 212-215,
for the care taken in drawing up these chronicles in the
English monasteries that were of royal foundation.

Modern Works.—Di S. Zaccaria Papa, by Cardinal Bartolini
(Ratisbon, 1879), a careful and exhaustive work, though the
knowledge of the geography of England therein displayed is
scarcely to be praised. The freest use has been here made
of this work. ;

EMPEROR OF THE KINGS OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Constantine V. Liutprand, 712-744. Eutychius 727-752
(Copronymus), 741-775. Hildeprand (alone), 744. (apparently the last
Ratchis, 744-749. of the exarchs),

Aistulf, 749-757.

ON the very day of the death of Gregory III. (December
10), according to Duchesne, but, according to others, four
days after the burial of Pope Gregory, viz. on Sunday,
December 3,741, Zachary, a Greek,! the son of Polychronius,

12. P. According to Bartolini (p. 3), Zachary was born at
Seberena, now St. Severina on the Neto in Calabria, which was part
of Magna Greecia, and was still dependent on Constantinople.

ST. ZACHARY 227

was consecrated Bishop of Rome. It need scarcely be
pointed out that, from the shortness of the vacancy of the
Holy See in this case, there can have been no reference to
exarch or emperor in connection with the election and
consecration of Zachary. Of the new Pope we are
informed, by the Book of the Popes, that he was a man
of extraordinary suavity—a trait in his character which
his success in dealing with his Lombard foes may well
incline us to believe—a lover of the clergy and people
in Rome,! slow to anger, quick to forgive, and never re-
turning evil for evil. On the contrary, returning good for
evil, he even, after he became Pope, honoured and
enriched those who had opposed him. Although regard-
ing this description of the character of Zachary as a
stereotyped ‘official eulogium, Gregorovius? allows, “with
respect, at least, to the benefits acquired for the Church,
the tribute in the case of Zachary to have been well
deserved.”
Doubtless one of the principal reasons why the consecra- The Pope

sends
tion of Zachary took place with such little delay was legates to

Liutprand,
the critical state of affairs between the Romans and the 741.
Lombards. We left Liutprand, angry with both the
Romans and the Lombards of Spoleto and Beneventum,
preparing to subdue both; and Transamund false to his
engagements to help the Romans to recover ‘the four
cities. The first thing that the new Pope did was to
send an embassy to Liutprand, to beg him to restore

the cities. Liutprand promised to do so; and in return

17. P. “Pro salute populi Romani suam ponere animam non
dubitaret.”

2 I]. p. 256. Even by Photius (Mystagogia, ap. Migne, P. G., t. cil.
p. 367) the ‘admirable Zachary’ is highly praised for his ‘learning and
miracles,’ and for promulgating throughout the world “by the trumpet
of his Greek translation, the writings of St. Gregory I.’ To Dr.
Hodgkin, /¢aly, vii. 97, he is ‘an eminent pontiff’

Zachary
has an
interview
with Liut-
prand
(742 ?)e

228 ST. ZACHARY

the Pope sent the forces of the duchy to help the king
against the faithless Transamund.}

But after Transamund had been disposed of (he had been
made a cleric), and his ‘kingdom given to another, Liutprand
imitated his example and would not move in the matter of
restoring the cities.2, Accordingly Zachary resolved to inter-
view the Lombard king in person. With a number of his
clergy in his train, the Pope set out boldly for Interamna
(Terni), where Liutprand was then staying. Arrived at
Orte, the Pope was met by an envoy of the king, who
escorted Zachary to Narni,? the key of the valley of the
Nera or Nar. On the great Flaminian road, eight miles
from Narni, the Pope encountered Liutprand himself, who
walked respectfully—zxz ejus obsequium—by Zachary’s side,
and likewise his nobles and a large number of his troops.
The king and the Pope, we are told, prayed and conversed
together; and then Zachary urged peace. Liutprand
agreed, and gave back ‘the said four cities with their
inhabitants’? to the Pope. He also restored (veconcessit)
the Sabine patrimony, which had been lost for thirty years,
and Narni, Osimo, Ancona, Humana, and the valley which
is called Great, by the title of donation to Blessed
Peter himself, the Prince of the Apostles, concluded a
treaty for twenty years with the Roman duchy, and set
free the Roman captives in his dominions. Before

1 Z.P. For some reason Gregorovius (zd.) sees fit to observe, that,
by this action of the Pope, Transamund was “ unhesitatingly sacrificed
to reasons of personal advantage.” Why should he not have been
‘sacrificed,’ seeing that he was himself first false to his agreement
with the Pope!

Oh Ly, JELS Bua SPRL Vek, YEasStat, {0 '7/5

8 On Narni and Terni and their scenery, c@ Miley, i. pp. 31-6. “ Pre-
dictas quatuor civitates ... . eidem sancto cum eorum habitatoribus
redonavit viro. Quas et per donationem firmavit” (Z. P.). “Auximanum,
etc., per donationis titulum ipsi b. Petro App. Principi, reconcessit”
(zd.). The ‘four cities’ were Ameria, Horta, Polimartium and Blera.

ST. ZACHARY 229

leaving the king, Zachary, at his request, consecrated a
new bishop for Terni(?), as some maintain. On the
Sunday the two dined together, and so merry was the
meal, that Liutprand declared that he had never had
such a glorious dinner before. The next day the Pope
set out for Rome, taking possession, ez route, of the
four cities, which officers of Liutprand, who escorted the
Pope, caused to be handed over to him. Zachary entered:
Rome in triumph; and to thank God for His mercies,
ordered a solemn procession from the Church of Our
Lady ‘ad Martyres’ (the Pantheon) to St. Peter's? (741
or the beginning of 742).

Into all this affair it is the personal element only which eae
enters. We have on the one hand the commanding
personal influence of Zachary, and on the other a Lombard
king moved to acts, if not of generosity, at least of justice,
by considerations of which the Pope was the sole centre.
Liutprand had no respect for the Iconoclast emperor at
Constantinople, and the only thought he gave to that em-
peror’s Italian dominions was to consider how he himself
might best obtain possession of them. Hence what was his
by the right of the spear he gave up, not to the emperor, who
with his image-breaking propensities was quite at a discount
with all parties in the Italian peninsula, but to the Pope per-
sonally. Pope Zachary was practically a king by consent of
Liutprand. In all these transactions there is no mention of
either emperor or Roman Republic. Liutprand and Zachary
are the only parties concerned. As far as the former was
concerned, the rule of the Byzantine in Italy was at an

1 The text of the Z. P. has “fin locum Cosinensis.” Duchesne (Z. P.,
ih 337) can see no reason for giving this as Terni. He thinks that the
text is corrupt, and suggesting that ‘the initial ‘Co’ might have come
from locum or loco, adroitly conjectures that the place may be Sienna,

which was, moreover, in Lombard Tuscany,
2 All straightforward in the Z. P

Liutprand
advances
against
Ravenna,
744s

230 ST. ZACHARY

end. And had it not been for Pope Zachary, there is

no doubt that Liutprand the Lombard, like Theoderic
the Goth, would have ruled in Rome and Ravenna.
Zachary had not yet finished with the Lombards. In
743 Liutprand began to make preparations for the final
reduction of Ravenna. Convinced of their powerlessness to
resist the old Lombard warrior, the exarch, the archbishop
of Ravenna (John), and the people sent to entreat the Pope
to hasten to their aid. As the embassy? that Zachary at
once sent off with presents to Liutprand failed in its object,
the Pope himself, after entrusting the government? of the
city to the Duke Stephen, “like a true shepherd hurried
off to save the sheep who were in danger of perishing.” 8
Whilst on their journey to Ravenna, the Pope and his
companions were, it is said, in answer, as we are assured, to
their fervent prayers to St. Peter, protected every day from
the heat of the sun by a cloud,* which disappeared every
evening. The Pope was met by the exarch at the Church
of St. Christopher, at a place—not now known—called ‘ad
Aquila, about fifty miles from Ravenna. When Zachary

1 One of the ambassadors was Bishop Benedict, ‘ Vicedominus’
or Prefect of the Lateran Palace. That he was bishop of Nomentum
appears from his signature at. the Roman Council of 745. (Cf
Bartolini, 76.)

2 “Relicta’ Romana urbe Stephano Duci ad gubernandum,” 2d,
After phrases such as these, there cannot be a doubt as to who was
the ‘Lord and Master’ of Rome.

Pb.

4Z. P. In at least one of the editions of the Lzser Pontificalis
this miracle of the cloud does not appear. In fact, Duchesne (Z. P., i.
introd. p. ccxxiv) shows that the incident has been interpolated into
the MSS. of the first edition of Zachary’s biography. The interpolation
is, however, of a very early date, apparently before the year 774. At
this period partial biographies of the popes were, sometimes at least, in
circulation during their lifetime (Duchesne, 2d. ccxxii), so that, in
this case, as the first notices of Zachary were probably drawn up by one
who accompanied the Pope to Ravenna, the absence of the story of
the cloud in the first edition is probably fatal to its truth,

ST. ZACHARY 231

drew near the city, all the inhabitants poured forth to
welcome him, crying out with tears in their eyes, “ Welcome
to our Shepherd, who has left his own sheep and come to
save us who are on the point of perishing.”

The first thing the Pope did on his arrival at Ravenna The Pope
was to despatch messengers to the Lombard king to ae
announce his coming. When they reached the Lombard 7**
borders at Imola, they found that orders had been given
not to allow the Pope to pass. During the night they
contrived that notice of this should be sent to the Pope.
So far from being daunted by this news, Zachary left
Ravenna (Saturday, June 22, 743), and, soon striking the
straight A‘milian Way,! he reached Placentia, June 28.
Here he was met by many of the Lombard nobility, who
had been sent by Liutprand to receive the Pope, though he
had refused to see Zachary’s messengers. Thus escorted,
the Pope pushed on to Pavia, which he entered the same
day, after having said Mass at three o’clock in the after-
noon? (as was usual on fast days) in the Church of St. Peter,
outside the walls. On the Monday (June 30), after a great
deal of opposition (duritia), Zachary carried his point ; and
Liutprand agreed to give up the parts around Ravenna
that were in his hands, and two-thirds of the district of
Cesena. The remaining part, and Cesena itself, he was
to keep in pledge till June 1, 744, by which time his
ambassadors would have returned from Constantinople,
whither, as Bartolini thinks,? they were sent by Liutprand
to have this treaty of peace ratified.

When the Pope left Pavia, Liutprand sent a number of
his nobles with him, to see that the recently conquered

1 Near Placentia (Piacenza) the Via AZ milia crosses the Po.
2“ Ad horam orationis nonam pro vigiliarum b, Petri celebrandis
solemniis missarum,” etc.

oP a79-

Death of
Liutprand
and acces-
sion of
Ratchis,
744.

232 ST. ZACHARY

territory should be restored to its owners. Zachary, on his
return! to Rome, ‘with all the people,’ sung a Mass of
thanksgiving for the success of his enterprise, begging of
God to save the people of Ravenna and Rome from any
further oppression on the part of the persecuting intriguer
Liutprand. “ His prayers,” adds his biographer, “ were heard
by the divine clemency,” for Liutprand died in January 744.
Further, “there was joy” not only among the Ravennese and
Romans, but even among the Lombards themselves, when
Hildeprand, Liutprand’s nephew (who had been associated
with him in the kingdom in 735), who was evilly disposed
(malevolus) to them, was expelled the kingdom, and

Ratchis (Duke of Friuli) was chosen in his stead.” To

1 Perhaps in time to celebrate the octave of SS. Peter and Paul,
“Denuo natale B. Petri et Pauli. . . . celebravit.”. Z. P. Duchesne
(Z. P., i. 437) thinks it is the feast of St. Peter's Chains (Aug. 1)
that is here referred to. In connection with this, Duchesne has an
interesting note which we will reproduce. In an Ordo Romanus
(MS. Vat. Reg. 1127 of the ninth century), not yet edited, it appears
that after the Pope and his assistants had removed their sacred
vestments in the sacristy, the szmdsters,as they do to this day after
episcopal masses, asked his blessing. Before leaving for their homes,
they drank three glasses of wine—et accepta benedictione de manu
ipsius, confirmant ternos calices. The wine which is passed round at
the end of Mass when ordinations have been held is, Duchesne
believes, connected with the rite just mentioned. Whilst the Pope
and clergy were drinking this wine at Easter time—which they then
did with special solemnity after Vespers—the Schola cantorum sang
a Greek hymn, Mdoyxa iepov. Cf Watterich, Vt. Pomt. I. ii.

27. P. Dr. Hodgkin (vi. 498) regrets “the song of triumph which
the papal biographer raises over the death of the intriguer and
persecutor Liutprand.” But, first, it is to be noted that the ‘song of
triumph’ is over the expulsion of Hildeprand; and, secondly, if it
were not, surely his death must have been felt as an immense relief
by the Romans and Ravennese. How can a man be regarded as a
friend who is always attacking you or yours, even if by one effort and
another you succeed in diverting his assaults, or even in wringing
concessions from him? History plainly shows that such were the
relations between Liutprand and those not under his jurisdiction.
And who finds it hard to forgive a man who rejoices over the death
of an enemy of his country?

ST. ZACHARY 233

the new king the Pope sent an embassy at once, and, “out
of reverence for the Prince of the Apostles,’ he granted
a peace for twenty years—a peace which wellnigh cost
Ratchis dear. It caused many of the Lombard nobles to
ally themselves with Aistulf, his brother, with a view of
his seizing the reins of government.! It is not, therefore,
matter for surprise that, with such a warlike spirit rife
among the chief men in his kingdom, Ratchis was driven,
willy-nilly, into breaking the peace he had made. In the
year 749, doubtless in the spring, his armies both poured
into the Pentapolis and invested Perugia. Without any
delay, the Pope, taking with him a few of the clergy and
nobility, hastened to Perugia, again determined to try
the effect of his personal influence. And again was he
successful. His presents? and eloquent entreaties so pre-
vailed on Ratchis that he drew off his armies. Like St.
Leo I., twice had he saved Rome from the barbarian. Nor
did the effect of his eloquence end there. Soon afterwards
Ratchis resigned his crown, and from the Pope’s own hand
received, along with his wife and daughter, the monastic
habit,’ following the example of Carlomann. As we might
have expected, his fierce brother Aistulf was elected in his
stead, June 749.4

17, P., and the Chronicle of Benedict, a monk of St. Andrew’s
(before the end of tenth century), ad an. 744, Sept. ‘‘ Propter hoc” (the
concession of the treaty of peace), says Benedict (ap. Pertz, 17. G. H,
iii. p. 702), “ Langobardi irritati adversus Rachisi rex (szc), et tractantes
cum Astulphus (!) de regno ejus.” Pertz notes that this information has

been drawn by Benedict from the Annals of Lauresheim, a most trust-
worthy source (Bartolini, p. 220 f.).

2 “Impensisque eidem Regi plurimis muneribus”—the Popes were
ever pouring forth of their treasure—“atque .... eum deprecans,

. ab obsessione ipsius civitatis eum amovit.” LZ. P. Cf. Chron.

Casenensis, ap. M. G. SS. Lang., p. 487.

3 7. P., and Chron. Cas.

4 Benedict of Soracte, Chvom., ap. Pertz, M. G. H., iii. “ Coronatus
est hisdem Astulfus in Mediolana hurben, infra Ecclesiam S, Ambrosii,

Ratchis in
rms

against the
exarch and

Pope, 749.

Ratchis
exchanges
a crown for
a cowl, 749.

St. Boni-
face writes
to con-
gratulate
Zachary
on his elec-
tion, 742.

234 ST. ZACHARY

To retain, as far as consistent with clearness, the chrono-
logical order of events, and because Zachary’s dealings
with Boniface are as important as any of the events of
his pontificate, we may here with advantage take up
the thread of the history of St. Boniface,! ‘the envoy
(missus) of St. Peter, as he is called in a capitulary of
Carlomann. As soon as he heard of the accession of
Zachary, Boniface wrote? at once to express to him his
great pleasure at his (Zachary’s) election, and to assure
him that he hoped to be as obedient a servant of his
(Zachary’s) as he had been of his predecessors, and to
bring all his converts to the same obedience. He then
went on to ask the Pope to confirm the three bishoprics
of Wurtzburg, Buraburg and Erfurt, which he had
established in Germany, to the end that “present or
future generations might not presume to interfere with
these dioceses or violate the commands of the Apostolic
See:

Zachary is then informed that Carlomann? duke of
the Franks, wanted Boniface to hold a synod in that
part of the kingdom of the Franks which was under his

et electus est Rex in mense Junius Indictione ii.,” or x., as by mistake it
reads in the Chronicle, Aztches seem to be the only thing that bother
Benedict! (Bartolini, p. 391.)

1 Cf. sup. 213.

2 Ep. 132, ed. S.; Ep. 50, Diim.; p.(3), ap. Bartolini ; his Italian trans-
lation occurs, p. 23 seg. “Optantes catholicam fidem et unitatem
Romane Ecclesize servare, et... . discipulos .... ad obedientiam
apostolicee sedis invitare et inclinare non cesso.” This letter is very
fully analysed in English, Conversion.of the Teutonic Race, ii. p. 146.

® On the death of Charles Martel, his two sons shared his power
between them. Carlomann held sway in Austrasia, the German portion
of the Frankish kingdom ; and Pippin in Neustria, the Gallic portion.
Boniface acknowledges his great dependence on the ‘Prince of the
Franks’—“ Sine patrocinio principis Francorum zecclesie regere .
non possum, nec ipsos paganorum ritus .... prohibere yaleo.” En,

60 D,

ST. ZACHARY 235

control, and had promised to do all in his power to
reform ecclesiastical discipline, which for some sixty or
seventy years had been neglected. To carry out his
design, Carlomann was anxious for the sanction of the
apostolic authority. “As the older men declare, it is
more than eighty years ago since the Franks held a
synod, had an archbishop, or made or renewed laws for
any church. Most of the sees! have been handed over
to laymen eager for gain, or to immoral clerics to enjoy
in a worldly way. If I am to carry out the duke’s wishes,
I desire to have behind me the power of the Apostolic
See.” Boniface next asked the Pope what steps he
should take against immoral bishops, or against such as
were given to drink, hunting, or fighting in battle.

In accordance with permission granted by Gregory III,
as Zachary knows, inasmuch as the permission was given
in his presence, Boniface had elected a successor. Now,
however, he wishes to get leave to choose another, as a feud
had sprung up between the one first elected and the Prince.

Boniface has to complain of various abuses which, under
pretence of permission from the apostolic See, or of
doing as they do in Rome, certain people wish to practise
in Germany. For instance, certain stupid Bavarians and
Franks think that they can practise all sorts of pagan
superstitions, because in Rome, under the very eyes
of the Pope, they have seen or heard, on the first
of January,? choruses singing pagan and _ sacrilegious

1 “ Maxima ex parte... . episcopales sedes traditae sunt laicis cupidis
ad possidendum, vel adulteratis clericis, scortatoribus, et publicanis seecu-
lariter ad perfruendum” (zd.). This state of things was due both to the
general civil disorder caused by intestine wars and by the inroads of the
Saracens; and to the action of Charles Martel, who rewarded his
veterans with the property and offices of the Church. The sword
severs all bonds, ecclesiastical as well as civil.

2’ We find that in the Council of Tours (567), c. 23, the assembled
bishops condemned those who honoured Janus on the Ist of January ;

Reply of
Zachary to
Boniface,

742 (?).

236 ST. ZACHARY

songs through the streets, pagan feasts, women bind-
ing their arms and legs in pagan fashion with amulets,
and offering the same for sale, and other heathen rites.
The Pope is urged to stop these customs.

Immoral bishops who have returned from Rome, saying
that they have obtained permission to celebrate, Boniface
has resisted, because he has never heard that the apostolic
See has given decisions against the canons. To show
his devotion to the Pope, he sends him, as a present, a
little gold and silver and a hairy towel for the feet,
(villosam unam)—an article we find that Boniface was
very fond of sending to his friends.

To this, to us most interesting letter, Zachary returned an
answer! (April 1, 742?) such as might have been expected.
He approves of the erection of the three sees, says he
has sent ‘letters of confirmation’ to each of the three
candidates, permits Boniface to be present at the synod,
and, by virtue of the apostolic authority, exhorts him
on no account to allow unworthy bishops to perform the
functions of the episcopal office. The Pope, however,
forbids Boniface to appoint his successor during his life-

and there are extant many denunciations of the Fathers against those
who continued to observe the pagan practices of the Ist January.
According to the mythology of the Romans, Janus presided over the
beginnings of everything, and therefore, of course, over the beginning
of the new year, which with them, as with us, began in January. The
presents (strenze) that people gave to one another on that day were so
called from the goddess Strenia, or Strenua, who was credited with
being able to make men strong—strenuous. The word survives in the
French ‘étrenne.” (Cf. Butler’s Lives of the Saints, i., note to the feast
of the ‘Circumcision’; Smith’s Classical Dict. in voce Janus, etc.).
Clearly the only practical way to deal with long-established popular
customs, if a change is desirable, is to alter their end or object. An
attempt to abolish them peremptorily will scarcely succeed. Canons 61
and 62 of the Quinisext Council (692) show that similar abuses existed
at Constantinople and the East at different times of the year.

1 Ep. 142, ed. S.; 51, ed. Diim. The chronological data at the end
of this letter give 743 as the time of its despatch,

ST. ZACHARY 237

time, as such a proceeding is wholly against the canons;
but, as a great personal favour, the Pope will ordain the
one whom, on his death-bed, in the presence of all,
Boniface may designate as his successor.

Zachary next assures Boniface that he has put an
end to all pagan customs on the ist of January, and
that his predecessor and father! had also issued a decree
against them. After approving of the action of Boniface
in the matter of those immoral bishops who had, of course,
falsely pretended to have been granted indulgence at
Rome, Zachary concludes by telling the archbishop to
refer to him what difficulties he cannot settle by the
canons, and assuring him that he (the Pope) has such
love for him that he would be glad to have him ever
by his side.

The holding of a synod was part of a scheme of reform The first
inaugurated by Boniface? for the whole Frankish kingdom, ee in
which both Carlomann and Pippin, who ruled respectively Bee ‘
over Austrasia and Neustria, were eager to carry out.

The wholesale decay of morals, which years of internal
and external wars had engendered, and which the reck-
less confiscation of Church property and the barefaced
bestowal of ecclesiastical offices on his soldiers indulged
in by Charles Martel had greatly increased, called for
immediate attention. Accordingly a synod, in which
all the ecclesiastics in Carlomann’s® realm were present,

1 “Nutritoris nostri,” zd. In the ‘letters of confirmation’ which
Zachary sent to Witta of Buraburg, and Burchard of Wurtzburg on the
same day (Epp. 52, 53, ed. D.), he forbids, by the authority of Blessed

Peter, anyone to interfere with their rights and their interfering with
one another’s rights.

2 “Cum Charlomanni et Pippini roboratum est imperium, tunc....
suggerente S. Bonifatio archiepiscopo, relegionis christianze confirmatum
est testamentum, et orthodoxorum patrum synodalia sunt in Francis
correcta instituta,” etc. Vit, S. Bonif., c. 7.

DIS ets

238 ST. ZACHARY

The synod
of Liftinze,
Mar. 1,

was held under the presidency of Boniface, as legate
of the Pope. The place at which this synod met is not
known for certain. It was held? April 21, 742.

Carlomann, who was present at the synod along with
many of his nobles, gave to its decrees the force of public
law. These decrees provided for the holding of synods
every year, and for the punishment of bad priests, forbade
clerics to wear the dress of laymen, or fight on the field
of battle, and ordered priests to obey their bishops.

In accordance with the decree of this synod of 742, rela-
tive to the annual holding of synods, there was assembled
at Liftinee (often on inferior authority called Liptinz)
again, in the dominion of Carlomann, a second synod, March
I, 7432 From the fragments of the acts that have
come down to us, we see that the first thing done was
that the bishops, counts and prefects* confirmed the acts
of the previous synod and promised to stand by them.
Various other decrees were passed to regulate the morals

1 Cf. Héfélé, Hirst. des Conc., iv. p. 397f., French trans.; Bartolini,
p. 47, and (10); Ep. 78, ed. S.; D. 56.

2 Again we are involved in chronological difficulties. Some refer
this synod to the year 745. However, as the letter of Zachary, next
to be quoted, which is generally allowed to refer to this synod, is
dated in the reign of Artavasdus, and as he had certainly ceased to
reign by the end of 743, we may well prefer the date 743. It is much
easier for copyists or others to make mistakes in the number of the
indiction, or in the dates of the emperor’s years, than in his name.
Liftinee is not the modern Belgian village of Lessines ; but the site of
the royal villa of that name is near the village of Binche, in the same
province of Hainault. On this synod, cf. Héfélé, iv. p. 402 (French
trans.) ; Bartolini, p. 69f. and (12)f Héfélé might well have sighed
for another edition of St. Boniface’s letters. There was but little hope
of avoiding chronological confusion in their use, as edited by Serarius
or Wiirdtwein. Jaffé’s later ed. (Bzb. Rer. Germ., iii.) is rather better.
But even Diimmler, their latest editor, despairs of a final chronological
settlement.

3 “Tn hoc synodali conventu .... omnes sacerdotes Dei, et
comites et preefecti prioris synodi decreta consentientes firmaverunt,
seque ea implere velle promiserunt” (can. I.).

ST. ZACHARY 239

of clergy and laity, and to prevent the sale of Christian
slaves to the heathen, or the practice of pagan rites.
Illustrative of the unsettled state of the times was a
decree to allow those who were holding confiscated
Church lands still to retain them, on condition of paying
a specified sum of money, owing to impending war.
In the month of August! of the same year Hartbert
took to Rome letters to the Pope from Carlomann, Pippin
and Boniface, in which, as may be gathered from the
Pope’s reply,? for the originals appear to be lost, Zachary
was informed of the holding of the council, and asked
to send palliums to Grimo, Abel and Hartbert, archbishops
respectively of Rouen, Rheims, and Sens. In his answer
to Boniface, Zachary says that he has sent the desired
palliums, and also letters on the use of the pallium, to
the prelates in question, and praises him for having
condemned “two false prophets in the province of the
Franks,” and put them in prison. The said false prophets
were two heretics who claimed to be bishops. One a
Frank, Adalbert by name, professed, not unlike Mahomet Adalbert
and Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormons, to have Seka
received from heaven by angelic hands letters and relics,
had himself worshipped, distributed his hair and_ nails
as relics to his infatuated followers, and taught correspon-
dingly outrageous doctrines. Clement, the other heretical
opponent of St. Boniface, went astray in the matter of
morals both in theory and practice; and in dogma
held that when Our Lord ‘descended into hell, he
did not leave any one there (where by ‘hell’ he in-
1 This date is got from Zachary’s letter of the 5th Nov. 743? (ep.
143, ed. S.; ep. 58, ed. D.), who in that letter speaks of the letter “quze
a tua directe sunt fraternitate per elapsum Augustum mensem, ubi
nobis indicasti quod et consilium, adjuvante Deo et’ Carlomanno

prebente consensum factum est,” etc.
2 Ep. 144, ed. S.3 57D. Cf Ep. 143 S.; 58 D.

Boniface
hints at
simony in
Rome,
743 (2).

240 ST, ZACHARY

cluded the abode of the lost as well as that of the souls
of the just who were waiting for the coming of Christ),
denied the Catholic rule of faith, viz., Scripture and
Tradition, as interpreted by the living voice of the Church,
and erred on the matter of predestination and other funda-
mental truths of Catholic teaching.

Before the last cited letter of the Pope reached Boniface,
he had sent off another to the Pope, in which he only
asked for one pallium, viz., for Grimo of Rouen, and hinted
at some simoniacal practices. Unfortunately Boniface’s
letter is not forthcoming. Replying to this letter on
November 5, 743 or 744, Zachary expresses” his astonish-
ment at the demand for only one pallium, and adds: “In
your letter we find what has greatly upset us. You speak
as though we... . which God forbid, and our clergy had
fallen into the heresy of Simon Magus, and had compelled
those to whom we sent palliums to give us money. But
we exhort you, dearest brother, never again write to us in
that strain. To impute to us what we thoroughly detest,
is to treat us very injuriously. The three palliums which,
at your suggestion, we were asked for, as well as the letters

1 On these heretics, cf Epp. 134-5, 139, 144-8, ed. S., or 59,77, 57, 62,
ed. D., of St. Boniface. ‘‘ Alium (Clementem) ita luxurize deditum, ut
concubinam haberet,” ep. 144, ed. S.; 57, ed. D.

2 Ep. 143, ed. S.; 58 D. Of course there are always some moderns
able to fill up any lacunz by their ‘ipse dixit’; and Mr. Kellet, Pofe
Gregory the Great, Appendix I., p. gt, asserts that “his (Boniface’s)
influence was not sufficient, however, to persuade two of these (arch-
bishops) to recognise the authority of Rome so far as to beg the
pallium from the Pope.” But, as we have seen, zome of them asked
for the pallium themselves. Boniface asked for the palliums for them.
And to judge from a letter of Boniface to the Pope (ep. 141, ed. S.; ep.
86, D.) some years later, it seems clear that the difficulty in the way of
appointing the three metropolitans arose from the rulers of the Franks
not keeping their word. “De palliis a Romana ecclesia petendis

. indulgentiam Apostolicee sedis flagito; quia quod promiserunt
(Franci), tardantes non impleverunt . .... quid inde perficere
voluerint, ignoratur ; sed mea voluntate impleta esset promissio.”

ST. ZACHARY 241

of confirmation and instruction, we have granted without
receiving anything from anybody.” In conclusion, so little
was the Pope displeased at the plain speaking of our saint,
that the sphere of Boniface’s action was enlarged by the
Pope. Jurisdiction was given to him over all Gaul.
Through the unceasing energy of Boniface, who at once
took advantage of his extended legatine powers, there were
renewed in Neustria, at a synod? of Soissons (March 2,
744), the decrees that had already been passed in the
synods in Austrasia. But corruption was more deep-
seated in Neustria. There were the worldly bishops—
such as Milo of Rheims, whom Abel had been elected to
succeed, but who was too strong to be dislodged—whom
Charles Martel had intruded into the various Sees; and
the introduction of reform was stoutly resisted. Carlomann
and Pippin were, however, in earnest in the matter, and by
their united efforts a council was held in 745, at which
bishops from both parts of the kingdom were present.
With regard to this synod, we are about as much in the
dark as we are with the others at which St. Boniface pre-
sided or which he summoned. Indeed, some authors?
identify this synod with that of Liftine. Among the
other deeds of this council seem to have been the con-
demnation of Adalbert and Clement, whom we have seen
imprisoned by St. Boniface to await their trial at a
council ; the deposition of Gervilio (Gewilieb), archbishop
of Mayence, for having assassinated the man who had
killed his father; and the excommunication of various
clerics for irregular life. To establish proper canonical
jurisdiction, it was decided that Boniface should have a

1 “Ea, que tibi largitus est decessor et praedecessor noster . .
augemus;.... et omnem Galliarum provinciam ... . nostra vice
: . Spiritualiter studeas norma reformare.” Jd.

2 Hefélé, iv. P- 422f., Fr. trans. Bartolini, p. 136 (36).

3 Cf. Héfélé, iv. p. 428f,, Fr. ed.

VOL, Pt. U: 16

Synod of

Soissons,

744

Combined
synods of
Austrasia
and
Neustria,

745:

Zachary is
thankful
for the
holding of
this synod,
745:

242 ST. ZACHARY

fixed metropolitan See; and as the See of Cologne was

vacant and was thought to be suitable, for it was on the
border of country still pagan, it was resolved that the Pope
be asked to sanction Cologne as a metropolitan See.’

In fine, from a letter which St. Boniface about this time
wrote to Cuthbert, Archbishop of Canterbury, we learn
that the council subscribed to a profession of faith and
proclaimed their loyalty to the See of Rome. “Our synod
declared? that to the end of their lives they wished to
preserve Catholic faith and unity and subjection to the
Roman Church, to St. Peter and his Vicar. We also de-
creed that metropolitans should ask for their palliums from
that See, and that we would, in accordance with canon
law, follow in all things the decrees of Blessed Peter, that
we might be numbered among the sheep entrusted to his
care.” The sequel of this letter shows that the decrees
issued in preceding councils for the reformation of
discipline were renewed* in this general synod of the
Franks.

As soon as the Pope received word of this council, in

1 This the Pope did. Ep. 138 S.; 60D. Oct. 31, 745.

2 Ep. 105 S.; 78 D. “Decrevimus in nostro synodali conventu, et
confessi sumus fidem Catholicam et unitatem, et subjectionem Romanz
Ecclesiz, fine tenus vitee nostree, velle servare : sancto Petro et Vicario
ejus velle subjici; . . . . Metropolitanos ab illa sede quzrere ; et, per
omnia, precepta Petri canonice sequi desiderare ; ut inter oves sibi
commendatas numeremur.” Diimmler assigns this letter to 747.

% It is touching to see in this letter how, in his zeal for the advance-
ment of God’s glory, Boniface seemed to himself to have effected
nothing, because he did not see after this synod an instantaneous
general improvement in morals. He says he is like a dog who can
only bark whilst he sees the thieves ‘break through and _ steal.’
“Cujus synodum congregandam et hortandam jussu Pontificis Romani,
et rogatu principum Francorum et Gallorum, suscepi. Circumfodi,
cophinum stercoris apportavi. ... Sed, proh dolor, officium laboris
mei... . simillimum esse videtur cani latranti, et videnti fures et
latrones frangere, subfodere, domum Domini sui, et quia defensionis
auxiliatores non habeat, submurmurans ingemiscat, et lugeat.”

ST. ZACHARY 243

a letter? addressed to “all the bishops, priests, deacons
and abbots; and to all the dukes, counts, and God-fearing
men throughout the ‘Gauls’ (per Gallias) and provinces
of the Franks,” Zachary thanks God that the synod he
had ordered had been held, through the help of their
‘princes, Pippin and Carlomann, and the agency of his
vicar Boniface; he exhorts them to persevere in their
obedience to Boniface, who is acting in his stead, and in
assembling in synod every year; and finally promises them
victory over their pagan foes, if they put in practice the
decrees of reform which they have passed.
The next step taken by Zachary was to call a council 2 Second

synod at

of seven bishops of Sees in the immediate neighbourhood Rome on
da ert

of Rome. This synod was held in the basilica of Theodore seo

ment, etc.,

(afterwards the oratory of St. Venantius), in the Lateran 745.
Palace, October 25, 745. With the bishops were seven-
teen priests of the Roman church—among whom we
find three Stephens, one of whom, at least, doubtless
sat on the chair of Peter. A rather more detailed
account of this synod will perhaps be found interesting.
When the bishops and priests were assembled, the book
of the Gospels in their midst, with the deacons and
inferior clergy standing round, Gregory, the regionary®
notary, and nomenclator,* said: “The priest Deneard, the

1 Ep. 137, ed. S.; 61 D. Bartolini, p. (11). Dated by Jaffé and
Diimmler, Oct. 31, 745.

2 Ep. 135 S.; 59 D. Bartolini, p. 162 and (47),

3 The appointment of seven regionary deacons, one to each of the
ecclesiastical regions of the city, to take down the acts of the martyrs is
generally ascribed to Pope Clement I. These were afterwards called
protonotaries. Cf. swzp., p. 103.

4 The business of the nomenclator (an important office in the papal
court) was to write out the names of those who were to be invited to
the Pope’s table (cf Ducange in voce). Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii.
443), quoting a fragment that may date from the end of the tenth
century, calls the nomenclator “the special proctor of wards, widows,
prisoners and oppressed.”

244 ST. ZACHARY

envoy of the most holy Boniface, archbishop of the pro-
vince of Germany, is without, and craves admittance.
What are your wishes?” On this, Deneard was allowed
to enter, and said: “My Lord! when in obedience to
your orders my master, Bishop Boniface, had assembled
a synod in the province of the Franks, and had exposed
the heresies of Adalbert and Clement, they were deposed ;
and, acting in harmony with the princes of the Franks,
he has put them in prison. However, they remain im-
penitent and continue to seduce the people. Hence I
present you this letter of my masters, that you may
make it binding in council.” In obedience to orders,
the notary and treasurer Theophanius read the said
letter, in which Boniface informed the Pope that, since
the council which he had held by his orders, he had had
a great deal to put up with from bad priests, and
especially from Adalbert and Clement, “men? unlike in
their errors but equal in crime.” Zachary is therefore
asked himself to condemn these men, that the people
may the more readily leave their errors. What those
errors, as well of abstract dogma as of practical morality,
were, we have already seen, so that there is no need of
repeating their enumeration by further extracts from this
letter. The reading of this document of the arch-
bishop brought the first session to a close. In the next
session, after the reading of Adalbert’s wild autobiography,
and of the letter which, written to him by Our Lord,
had dropped from heaven, the Pope remarked that
only those with the minds of women or children *could
pay any attention to writings of that description. In
the third session a prayer was read which Adalbert
had written to himself, and in which angels with

+ “Specie erroris diversi, sed pondere peccatorum pares.” Ep. 59
D. Bartolini, p. 158 (46).

ST. ZACHARY 245

names,' such as Uriel, Raguel, etc., were invoked. Zachary
ordered these extraordinary productions to be stored in
the archives? of the church, and the synod declared the
two heretics degraded, and, along with their followers,
anathematised,

A few days after the synod was over, the Pope wrote?
to Boniface, bidding him not to be disheartened if the
enemy had oversown with cockle the field in which he had
laboured so hard, sympathising with him on the damage
which a late inroad of barbarians had wrought in his
flock by reminding him that the ‘Roman state’ has often
been depopulated by like causes, congratulating him on
the great synod he had held, approving of the establish-
ment of Cologne as his metropolitical See, replying to
various questions* about the rebaptising of heretics, etc.,
which Boniface had asked him in three different letters,
and sending him a copy of the condemnation of Adalbert
and Clement in the hope that those who heard it read
would give up their impiety.

Adalbert and Clement, either in their own persons or

1 On these names of supposed angels, cf Bartolini, p. 170f.

2 “ Oportunum est ut in sancto nostro scrinio referentur.” Ep. 59 D.

3 Ep, 138, ed. S.; 60 D. Bartolini, p. 197 (52).

4 Ep. 134, ed. S.; 68 D. Two ‘religiosi viri’ (priests), Virgilius and
Sidonius, had written to the Pope to say that Boniface had ordered
them to rebaptise those whom an ignorant priest had baptised “in
nomine patria, et filia,” etc. Zachary accordingly wrote to Boniface
that if such were the case—we have no letter of Boniface to let us
know whether it was or not—those who had been thus baptised
were not to be rebaptised. This letter bears the date 744 or 746.
Virgilius and Sidonius were from the ‘province of Bavaria.” As in
another letter (Ep. 140, ed. S.; 80 D.), the Pope declares that, with
regard to the priests Virgilius and Sidonius, he acknowledges what
Boniface has written, and says that of course more credit is due to his
word than theirs, it is possible that the two were not telling the truth in
the matter of this question of rebaptising. Ep. 142, ed. S.; 87 D., gives
answers to a great many other questions asked by Boniface, on various
points of Canon Law, etc. This letter is dated Nov. 4, 751.

Zachary
sends
word to
Boniface
about this
council,
etc., 745.

Adalbert
and
Clement
again to be
examined,
745°

246 ST. ZACHARY

through their friends, apparently put forward some plea
why judgment should be stayed. For on January 5, 747,'
the Pope wrote to Boniface to tell him that he had sent
answers to different questions on the subjects of clerics
and matrimony propounded to him by Pippin; and that,
at the synod that he (Boniface) must call to make the
answers public, he was to summon the two sacrilegious
and contumacious ex-bishops Adalbert and Clement, that
their cause? might be again thoroughly sifted. If, on
being convicted of error, they show themselves wishful
to turn to the right path, the synod and the prince of
the province are to treat them as they think proper, in
accordance with the canons. If, on the other hand, they
continue with proud obstinacy to proclaim their innocence,
they are to be sent with two or three most prudent and
upright priests to the Pope, who will thoroughly investi-
gate their cause himself and treat them as they may
deserve. As to what finally became of these men history
is silent. Adalbert at least, as the Pope himself observed
in the synod at Rome, was certainly insane; so that it

1 Such is the date of the letter (Ep. 139, ed. S.; 77 D.) as we now
have it; and so it is dated by Jaffé. Bartolini, however, refers it,
along with a decretal letter sent to Pippin at the same time (viz.,
ep. ‘Gaudio magno’) which is mentioned in the letter in question to
Boniface, to the year 744, before the Council of Soissons (Bart., pp.
117-8). The date 747 is kept here on account of the mention of a
‘second thorough investigation’ of the case of the two heretics. The
letter to Pippin (ap. Cenni, i. 41; ap. Migne, Cod. Carol., tom. 98)
consists of 27 decrees on various topics, such as divorce, fallen
religious, etc., which show at least the disorders from which the
Church in France was suffering, and the ignorance of its clergy, who
had to ask the solution to such questions. For the letter is addressed
to the “bishops and abbots in the country of the Franks,” as well as
to Pippin.

* “Ad medium deducantur sacrilegi illi et contumaces, Adelberthus

. et Clemens, Exepiscopi, ut eorum denuo, subtili indagatione,
cribretur causa,”

ST. ZACHARY 247

is to be hoped that some milder asylum than a prison
was found for him.
In the midst of all his difficulties, Boniface had a firm Zachary
encourages

friend in the Pope. In the letters that he wrote to Boni- ana

. supports
face there were always kind words of encouragement, Boniface,

and in the letters that he wrote to other bishops! he 747 ~
always supported the authority of Boniface, reminding
them that their archbishop was acting for him, that is,

for Blessed Peter. He would not send another? to hold
councils and represent the Apostolic See whilst Boniface
lived. In every way Zachary showed himself a hearty
co-operator in the work Boniface was about.

And certainly that help was needed. Boniface was ee
beset by ignorant or malicious opponents. One of these podes,’
foes is more particularly well known from an idea that, em
as a man very much in advance of his age, he taught the
existence of the antipodes; and that the Pope in his
ignorance condemned the said teaching. The /acts of
the case are these. In the letter just quoted (Ep. 80 D.),
the Pope writes: “I understand from your letter that
Virgilius (I forget whether* he was described as a priest)
has been acting maliciously against you, because you

1 Cf. Ep. 136 S.; 82 D., to Reginfrid of Rouen and some dozen
other bishops.

2 Ep. 140 S.; 80 D. Dated May 1, 748 (?).

3 “ Nescimus si dicatur presbyter”—important words, as they show
that this Virgilius is not the same as the one mentioned in connection
with the ‘baptism in nomine patria,’ etc. (see sw., p. 245, note 4), who,
both in this letter (ep. 80 D.) and in the preceding one, is mentioned
along with Sidonius. In Ep. 68 D. the two are described as ‘religious
men’ (viri religiosi), and in this very letter, in the paragraph following
the one now being cited in the text, the two are set down as ‘priests.’
The said paragraph begins: “Pro Sidonio autem supra dicto, et
Virgilio, presbyteris, quod scripsit sanctitas tua, agnovimus.” Evi-
dently the subject matter and the individuals treated of in this
paragraph are different to those discussed in the one quoted in the

text.

248 ST. ZACHARY

showed that he had wandered from true Catholic
teaching, trying to make enmity between you and Odilo,
Duke of Bavaria. Nor is it true, as he says, that he has
been absolved by me so that he may obtain the diocese
of the deceased bishop,! who was one of the four that
you consecrated in Bavaria. If it be true, moreover, that
he teaches? that beneath the earth there is another world
and other men, call a council, excommunicate him, and (if he
be a priest) deprive him of his dignity. We have, however,
ourselves written to the duke about Virgil, and sent a
letter to the latter summoning him to appear before us,
that he may be condemned, if, after a careful examination,
he be found to err in his teaching.”

The above passage contains all that is known of the
teaching of Virgil relative to ‘another world.” It cannot,
therefore, be stated with any degree of certainty whether,
arguing from the rotundity® of the world, he simply in-
ferred the existence of antipodes, or whether he went a step

1 There is, further, no reason for believing that this Virgil, who in
748 was intriguing for a bishopric, is the same as St. Virgilius, the
famous Irishman who was the apostle of Carinthia, and who became
bishop of Salzburg in 768, some twenty years later. (See Gams, Sevzes
Episcop., p. 307; Bartolini and the authorities on the Zzfe of Sz.
Virgil, p. 385 ; and The Conversion of the Teutonic Race, ii. p. 168.)
By a judicious combination of these three Virgils, Bower (st. of the
Popes), quite in his own way, makes a very edifying story! Bishop
Healy, however (/relana’s Schools, p. 566 f.), also treating these Virgils
as one, tells the story of Virgil or Fergil very differently.

2 “Si clarificatum fuerit, ita eum confiteri, quod alius mundus, et
alii homines sub terras sint, hunc . . . . ab ecclesia pelle.” Ep. 80 D.

® That the world was a sphere was held by many of the Fathers,
e.g., St. Augustine (De civit. Dez, xvi.9. He writes: “Etiamsi figura
conglobata et rotunda esse credatur, szze aligua ratione monstratur”) ;
Philoponus (De mund. creat., iii. c. 12 and 13, ap. Galland, xii. pp.
535-7); Bede (De Nat. Rer., c. 46), where he says: “terra figuram
absoluti orbis efficiat,” ap. Lingard, Ang.-Sax. Church, ii. p. 158), etc.
Hence some Fathers inferred the existence of the antipodes, e.g.,
St. Hilary (@ Psalm., n. 32); Origen (De Princip., 1. ii. c. 3; n. 6; ed.
De la Rue); Pope St. Clement (ep. 1, ad. Cor. n. 20); whilst on the

ST. ZACHARY 249

further and argued, on the old pagan lines, for the exis-
tence of antipodeans, who constituted an entirely different
race of men, not descended from Adam. If Virgil confined
himself to the first conclusion, he would not have been
condemned by the Pope; but if he taught the second, he
would, as that conclusion is opposed to the teaching of
the Church on the redemption of all men by Our Lord.
And here it may be observed in general, that, despite all
the assertions of her rash critics to the contrary, the
Church does not attempt to condemn the legitimate
conclusions of science from its own data in its own
domain. The Church only raises her protest when
scientific conclusions are introduced into the realm of
theology, and scientific data are made to take the place
of theological data.

Already, in his letter of May 1, 748, the Pope speaks of Bonlises

fixes his
Boniface as then residing not at Cologne, but at Mayence. metro-
political
He gives as the reason of this that the ‘Franks had not See at
‘kept their promise.” Three years later, in response to the 7s;
united wishes of Boniface himself and that of the ‘sons
of the Franks, Zachary issued a decree? to Boniface,
in which he decided that, “‘by the authority of Blessed
Peter, the Church of Mayence be for ever the metro-
political See of you and your successors, and that it have
subject to it the five cities (czvztates) of Tongres, Cologne,
Worms, Spires and Utrecht, and all the nations of
other hand, in the absence of evidence, some like St. Augustine (2d.)
and Lactantius, Jzsdzz., iii. 24, did not believe in their existence.
Though St. Augustine makes it quite plain (zd., c. 8) that wherever men
are to be found on this earth, they are the descendants of Adam.

1 Cf. Somnium Scipionis. On this subject of the ancients and the
antipodes, and the condemnation by Pope Zachary, cf Barthélemy,
Erreurs et Mensonges Historiques, vol. i.; Bartolini, pp. 380-388.

2 Nov. 4,751. Cf Ep. 88 D.; Bartolini, p. 494 and (84). “ Obtinere
voluisti (Bonifacius), ut tibi cathedralem Ecclesiam ... . confirmare
debeamus, juxta eorundem filiorum Francorum petitionem.”

Boniface’s
monastery
of Fulda,

751.

250 ST. ZACHARY

Germany, to whom, by your preaching, you have brought
the light of Christ.”?

In one of the last letters that Boniface sent to Zachary,
he wrote”: “In the midst of a vast solitude there is a
woody spot, in the midst of which I have built a monastery,
and placed therein monks of the order of St. Benedict,
men who lead a very strict life, abstaining from flesh and
wine, and working with their own hands. This place
was the gift particularly of Carlomann, once Prince of the
Franks. I have dedicated it to Our Saviour. Thither,
with your consent, I would retire for a few days at a time
to recruit the strength of my aged frame, and there would
I like to lie after my death.” The monastery here spoken
of is the famous monastery of Fulda, one of the greatest
centres of learning in Germany in the Middle Ages.

In his reply? (November 4, 751) to this letter of Boni-
face, the Pope says that he has granted Boniface’s request
in the matter of the monastery; and there is extant‘
the brief by which Zachary frees the monastery from
subjection to any jurisdiction but that of Rome. This
exemption Boniface then managed to get confirmed 5
by Pippin, ‘King of the Franks,’ for the “love of God
and the veneration he bore St. Peter.” Here, once again,
must we leave the narrative of St. Boniface’s connection
with the See of Rome (a see with which it was his one
wish always to be on the best of terms—cupio .... in

1 “8B, Petri auctoritate sancimus, ut supradicta ecclesia Moguntina,
atque etiam perpetuis temporibus tibi et successoribus tuis Metropolis
sit confirmata,” etc., 24, The document was ordered to be preserved
in the archives of the church of Mayence.

2 Ep. 141, ed. S.5 86 D., an. 751.

8 Ep. 142, ed. S.; 87 D.

4 89 D. This privilege Zachary had already granted to Mt. Cassino
(see infra, p. 258). From his acts in favour of the monks, and other

reasons, Bartolini thinks that Zachary was himself a Benedictine monk.
6 Ep. 151, ed. S.; or ap. Othlonum, zz vit. S, Boni/., p. 81.

ST. ZACHARY 251

familiaritate Romane ecclesi@.... perseverare, ep. 86)
to conclude it under the Lz/e of Pope Stephen (II.) III.

In seeking for the causes of the wonderful success His
achieved by our great countryman “among the races of mae
Germany to whom he was sent,” there is no doubt that,
apart from his burning zeal and his capacity for work, which
for so many years he strained to its utmost tension, one of
the chief ones was the amiability of his character. This it
was. before which opposition melted away, this made all
wishful to work with him, this attached all men to him.
Not only was he beloved by the popes, who, as we have seen,
would have had him always with them, but he was dear to
the whole Roman Church. Its deacons and its archdeacons
were constantly writing to him the kindest of letters, and
sending him presents. He had the greatest influence with
the ‘ Princes of the Franks, who ever showed themselves
ready to do all he wanted ; and the people of his country,
whether men or women, were always most devoted to him.
Every letter that is addressed to him is full of affectionate
language. Hence, not unnaturally, is one loath to leave
the delightful collection of his letters and those of his
friends.

In the early part of the year 742 Pasar sent legates Zectiany
to Constantine V. with letters, as well for the emperor ‘ ee
as for the Church of Constantinople. The emperor was eS
exhorted to restore the holy images, and the Church of "? patho!
Constantinople was put in receipt of the Pope’s synodical
letter or profession of faith. On their arrival in Con-
stantinople, the legates found that Constantine V. was no
longer in power there. Taking advantage of his absence
on a campaign against the Saracens, his brother-in-law,
the orthodox Artavasdus, took possession of the imperial

1 Cf. the letter of Pope Hadrian I., read in the second session of the
Seventh General Council, and the Z. P.

252 ST. ZACHARY

city, and had himself crowned towards the close of the year
741. The papal ambassadors were prudent enough not to
recognise the usurper, but in retirement awaited the issue
of events. It was not long before Constantine appeared
with an army before his capital, and by November 743
Byzantium was in his hands and the cause of Artavasdus
was lost. Pleased at the action of the Pope’s legates,
Constantine had them sought out, and for once showed
himself well disposed to the Church of Rome. For in
accordance with the expressed wish of the Pope, the
emperor, in writing, granted to Zachary and the Roman
Church for ever the two estates known by the names of
Nympha and Normia (now Norma), which had till then
remained in the hands of the emperor.2. These two estates
were of very considerable value ; and it has been suggested
that Constantine wished to make some compensation for
the confiscation of the Calabrian and Sicilian patrimonies.

But Zachary had not much communication with the East,
at least as far as our knowledge goes. Such as he had was
confined to writing? to the emperor from time to time, to

1 Finlay (Byzantine Empire, p. 56) says: “The Pope acknowledged
him (Artavasdus) as emperor.” This statement is only true if the
Pope’s use of his name in dating documents be regarded as an
acknowledgment of his claims. It is not certain whether Artavasdus
reigned from 741-3 or from 742-4.

2 “Donationem in scriptis de duabus massis, que Nymphas et
Normias appellantur, juris pudblice existentes,.... Pape S. R. E.
jure perpetuo direxit possidendas.” (Z.P.) These two cities were in
the territory that used to be inhabited by the Volscians. Norma was
built on the top of a lofty precipice. Was it the strength of its position
that kept it independent of the Duchy of Rome? Bartolini (p. 108)
argues that this cession of these cities to the Pope shows that the
emperor implicitly recognised the temporal sovereignty of the Pope
over the Duchy of Rome. What had been under the jurisdiction of
the empire (cities—juris publici existentes) was made subject to the
jurisdiction of the See of Rome (jure S. R. E. possidendas.)

* The letter cited above of Pope Hadrian states that Pope Zachary
and other popes “s@fzus avum seu genitorem vestre tranquillitatis pro

ST. ZACHARY 253
beg him to give up his persecution of ‘image worship’ and
its adherents. Whilst Zachary was Pope, Constantine V.
was so much occupied, first with the rebellion of Artavasdus
and then with the ravages of a great plague, that he had
not much leisure to attend to the image controversy,
or the relations between them might have been more
frequent than pleasant. For the persecution against
those who dared to oppose the imperial will in the matter
of the ‘images’ still went on; and unless he has been
very much maligned by Theophanes,! Constantine’s char-
acter seems to have been on a par with his nickname,
Copronymus.

Whilst pushing on reform in the Frankish kingdom, sree at

through his legate Boniface, the Pope did not neglect to
attend to needed reforms at home. In the autumn of 743
he presided over a synod of some forty bishops, twenty-two
priests and six deacons,? in which fifteen decrees were
promulgated. These decrees regulated various points of
discipline in connection with bishops, priests and nuns;
forbade marriages within certain degrees of kindred;

statuendis Imaginibus deprecati sunt.” The letter was addressed to
Constantine and Irene.

1 Adan. 732. Finlay (The Byzantine Empire, p. 53), after asserting,
“ Historians tell us that Constantine was a man possessing every vice
disgraceful to humanity, combined with habits and tastes which must
have rendered his company disgusting and his person contemptible,”
proceeds to ascribe “the obloquy heaped on his name,” “to the blind
passion inspired by religious bigotry.” On this method of dealing with
the evidence of respectable contemporary authorities, our readers must
judge for themselves. Theophanes and Nicephorus may not in the
telling have underrated the vices of Constantine ; perhaps they may
even have given expression to what the ‘image worshippers’ sazd
about the emperor. But after making due allowance for these
possibilities, Constantine’s character was undoubtedly brutal. Cf
Bury, Later Roman Empire, ii. 460-1, 6.

2 Cf. Mansi, xii. 381 ; Héfélé, Conczles, iv. 419. Among the names of
the priests and deacons occur several ‘ Stephens’ and one Paul—doubt-
less some of Zachary’s successors.

€, 743.

Carlomann
becomes a
monk,

747

264 ST. ZACHARY

anathematised those who kept the 1st of January! and the
25th of December (the feast of Bacchus) after the pagan
fashion, as well as those who sold Christian slaves? to
the Jews; and ordered disputes between clerics to be
settled by the bishops or by the Pope, and that all bishops
who are subject to the Pope (as patriarch of the West)
come ‘ad limina apostolorum’ (viz., to Rome, to the
Pope), if near at hand, every year on the 15th of May,
but if they reside at a distance, in accordance with
their ‘indult.’?

One of the events that made the greatest stir in
Zachary’s reign, not only in Rome, but over a large part of
Europe, was the arrival (747) in the Eternal City of the
great and successful Prince of the Franks, Carlomann, to
become a monk. His departure for Rome and his becoming
a monk is noted in chronicle after chronicle. The influence®
of St. Boniface upon him had been very great, and under
it he strove to advance in virtue day by day. But as he
felt that he could not make that progress towards per-
fection which he wished whilst still ‘in the world, he chose,

1 Cf. sup. Pp. 235 note.

2 Discovering that some Venetian merchants had come to Rome
and bought up a number of serfs to sell to the Moslems in Africa,
Zachary, deciding that it was not right that those cleansed with the
baptism of Christ should serve infidels, put an end to the vile traffic,
gave the merchants their price, and freed the poor serfs (Z. P. in vit.).
Cf. Cod. C., ep. 65, Migne, 64, for action of Pope Hadrian against the
Greek slave trade.

3 Can. 4. ‘“Omnes episcopi, qui hujus Apostolicaze Sedis ordinationi
subjacebunt, qui propinqui sunt, annue Idibus mensis Maii SS. Petri et
Pauli liminibus preesententur: qui vero de longinquo, jwxta chiro-
graphum suum impleant.” De Saucliéres and Héfélé both, by some
mistake, give the canon as though those bishops who lived at a
distance had simply ‘to write’! Cf the Liber Diurnus, F. 74, Cautio
Episcopi. (Bartolini, p. 87 note.)

* A considerable number of them are cited by Bartolini, p.

227%
5 Cf. Othlo’s Life of St. Bontface, 1. i. p. 74.

ST. ZACHARY 2te

continues? the biographer of St. Boniface, “the best part,
which shall not be taken away from him” (St. Luke x. 42).
That is to say, he determined to embrace the veligdous Life.
According to one chronicle? his desire to leave the world
was quickened by the reflection of the thousands of men
who had fallen in the wars he had had to undertake.
However that may be, he entrusted his kingdom and his
son to the charge of his brother Pippin, and, with a
numerous train of followers, bearing considerable presents
for the Pope from both Pippin and himself, betook him
to Rome, and at the hands of Pope Zachary? received
the clerical tonsure and the habit of amonk. At first he
withdrew to Mount Soracte, some twenty-eight miles from
Rome, to a monastery which he had himself built, and
which may still be seen. “He there enjoyed for several
years the repose he sought for, in company with the
brothers of the order (Benedictine) who had gone with
him. He was, however, obliged to change his place of
residence, because many of the Frankish nobility, when
making pilgrimages to Rome to fulfil their vows, broke, by
their frequent visits to him, that quiet which he most of all
desired, since they were unwilling to pass by unnoticed
one who had formerly been their king. As constant inter-
ruptions of this sort hindered the object of his retirement, he
betook himself (by the advice of the Pope)® to the monastery

1 Cf, Othlo’s Life of St. Boniface, \. ii. p. 80. “ Quum eandem
dilectionem (Dei et proximi), non ea quee voluit integritate in seeculari
habitu constitutus, implere przevaleret, elegit optimam partem, que
non auferetur ab eo.”

2 Ann. Petav., ap. Pertz, M. G. 77., vol. i, ed. Hanov. “ Karolo-
mannus intravit Alamanniam, ubi fertur quod multa hominum milia
ceciderit. Unde compunctus regnum reliquit,” etc. ad an. 746. Dr.
Hodgkin, J¢aly, etc., vii. 109, argues with some probability that the
slaughter here alluded to was of a ¢reacherous character.

3 ZL. P. in vit.; Chron. Motssiac, ap. Pertz, M. G. 7, 1, etc.

4 Annal. Wirziburg., ap. Pertz, 20., il. 5 Chron. Moisstac,

The
council of
Cloveshoe,

Sept. 747.

256 ST. ZACHARY

of St. Benedict on Mount Cassino, in the province of
Samnium, and there passed the remainder of his life in
religious exercises.”! The last remark of Charlemagne’s
famous biographer is, as we shall see later, not quite
accurate. At the bidding of his abbot Gratianus, he left
his monastery in the year 753, and went to France to try
to ward off from the said monastery the destruction with
which the Lombard king Aistulfus threatened it. He
died at a monastery in Vienne in 755.

In the same year in which he bestowed the monastic
habit on Carlomann, Zachary was working for an improve-
ment in morals in England. Informed of the decay in
discipline that began to set in after the death of the
great archbishop Theodore, the Pope ordered a council
to be held, and those who should oppose its decrees to
be anathematised. The letters of the Pope conveying
these orders are lost, but of their former existence and
purport the opening words? of the council itself assure
us. The synod was opened with the reading of two
letters received from the Pope, “ who was held in reverence
by the whole world.” These letters were read “as the
Pope had himself ordered, with the greatest care, first
in Latin and then in an English translation. In these
writings he admonished the people of this island, lovingly
exhorted them, and finally threatened to cut off from

1 Eginhard’s Vzta Carol., c. 2, Eng. trans.

2 “Scripta toto orbe venerandi pontificis papee Zachariz in duabus
chartis prolata sunt, et cum magna diligentia, juxta guod ipse
apostolica sua auctoritate preecepit, et manifeste recitata, et in nostra
quoque lingua apertius interpretata sunt. Quibus namque scriptis,
Britanniz hujus insule nostri generis accolas familiariter preemonebat

et hac omnia contemnentibus .... anathematis sententiam
proferendam insinuabat.” (Wilkins, Cove., i. 94 ; Haddan and Stubbs,
iii, 360 f.) The eloquent letters of St. Boniface to Cuthbert, Archbishop
of Canterbury, and to the dissolute Ethelbald, King of Matas had
doubtless done much to direct attention to the Ae of reform,

ST. ZACHARY 257

the communion of the Church, all who should despise
his warning and obstinately persist in their wickedness.”
There assembled (September 747) at the council, held at
Cloveshoe, which some think to have been a town near
Rochester, and others Abingdon, then known as Sheovs-
ham, some dozen bishops and a considerable number of
ecclesiastics, Ethelbald, King of Mercia, and thirty-three
of his chief nobility... Over thirty canons were drawn
up for the reform of the clergy and monastic bodies, for
the better rendering of the divine service, and for the
general advancement of piety. Hence every effort was
ordered to be made to foster a love of study and the
Holy Scriptures; and in whatever regarded the Mass
and the sacred chant, all were commanded to follow
the customs and teachings ‘of the Roman Church.’?
Altogether the decrees? of Cloveshoe were of a most
useful and practical order. Well worthy are they of
being read and studied at any time. They cannot fail
to have been productive of good in the eighth century.
The year 748 is a most important one in the history Zachary

consecrates

of monasticism. In that year was completed the restora- the pe
AS11Ca O}
tion of Monte Cassino, the chief seat of the greatest Monte

religious order that has ever graced and strengthened the Coral
Church—the Benedictine. The work, begun by the abbot
Petronax* under the auspices of Gregory II., was
continued by the same zealous monk with the aid of

1 Malmesb., De Gest. Pont., i.

2 Cf. canons 13, 15, 16,18. “Celebrentur juxta exemplar, videlicet
quod scriptum de Romana habemus ecclesia.” Wilkins, i. 96. Stubbs,
iil, 367.

CF Lingard, Anglo-Saxon Church, i. pp. 111-3, and note G;
Héfélé (Fr. ed.), iv. p. 466 seg.; Flanagan, Hist. of the Church in
England, i. p. 157 £.; Bartolini, 247 f.

4 Cf. sup., p. 163; Paul the Deacon (vi. 40), who adds that Zachary,
‘the first of priests’ (sacerdotum preecipuus), gave great assistance to
Petronax. Cf infra.

VOL. I. PT. Il. Ne

258 ST. ZACHARY

Gregory III, and completed with such munificent assist-
ance from Pope Zachary, that the credit of the entire
restoration was assigned to him.! Attended by thirteen
archbishops and sixty-eight bishops, Zachary performed
the dedication ceremony, venerated the bodies of St.
Benedict and his sister St. Scholastica, confirmed the
various donations and possessions of the monastery,
exempted the abbot from any episcopal jurisdiction,
except from that of Rome, granted him certain of the
honours that are usually confined to bishops, and himself
gave various presents to the monastery. Besides a copy
of the Holy Scriptures—his copy of the Gospels is said
to be still preserved there—he presented the abbey with
the copy of his rule, which St. Benedict had written out
with his own hand, and his weight for the bread and
his measure for the wine which the saint allowed his
monks. These precious memorials of their founder the
monks had saved from the first destruction of their
monastery under Zoto and his Lombards. Presented by
them (the monks) to Pope Gregory II., as an act of
gratitude for the kindness they had received at the
hands of the popes during their sojourn in Rome, these
interesting mementos were thus restored to them by
Zachary.” The bull of Zachary, dated February 18, from
Aquino, on the strength of which some of the above
statements with regard to Monte Cassino and the Pope
rest, has been rejected by Muratori, Jaffé and others

1 Cf. Chron. S. Bened, ap. M. G. SS. Langob. p. 483. “Iste
(Zacharias) restauravit monasterium S. Benedicti.”. The Pope’s bull,
Omnipotenti Deo, printed in full by Bartolini, p. [57], in Italian, p. 278,
sets forth his share in the work.

* Cf. Peter the Deacon ; and Leo Ost. ap. Bartolini, p. 263 note
and p. 268 respectively. The bronze weight, with the name of Pope
Gregory III. let into it in small silver letters, is still to be seen at
Monte Cassino.

ST. ZACHARY 250

as spurious. It has been received here as, to say the
least of it, many of the arguments against its genuine-
ness have been disproved by Troya.!

By another bull,? bearing the same date as the previous
one,® Zachary confirmed the rule of St. Benedict, ordered
the feasts of SS. Benedict, Scholastica and Maurus to be
kept by the community as doubles of the first class,
z.€., with the same solemnity as Christmas Day.

Over the authenticity especially of the first of these The boay
bulls there has been a fierce controversy—a controversy Bancdice
in which not a few among the best of modern historians
have been engaged. We allude, of course, to the famous
dispute as to whether the body of St. Benedict was or
was not in the seventh century (672 or 673) removed by
some Gallic monks from Monte Cassino to Fleury by the
Loire. Discussion on this topic has been going on for
the greater part of a thousand years; and when last
summer (1901) we visited what still remains of the once
glorious abbey of Fleury (viz., a fine romanesque church),
we were assured that the French monks‘ had at length

1 Cod. Diplom. Langob., iv. p. 302 f., whose arguments are given in
short by Bartolini, p. 264f. The last-named author dates the origin of
the creation of ‘abbots wz/lzus, as they are called, from this exemption
of the abbot of this monastery of Mt. Cassino from episcopal control.
But from instances we have already given of similar action by the
popes (¢.g., G6 p. 19 for the action of Adeodatus in France, and
p. 85 for that of Sergius in England), this would seem a not quite
accurate statement. By a bull of 752 (Cum Sanctam, ap. Bartolini,
p. (84) and p. 531f.), the authenticity of which is defended by Bartolini
and others, Zachary confirmed the exemption of the clerics of the
monastery of St. Denis from the jurisdiction of the bishops of Paris,
and the subjection of the said clerics to their own abbot only—a
privilege granted them by Landeric, Bishop of Paris.

2 Ap. Bartol., p. (73), in Italian, p. 365.

3 The authenticity of this bull, questioned by many, is stoutly
defended by Bartolini, pp. 336-7.

4 Les Religues de S. Benoit, par le P. Dom. F. Chamard, Paris,

260 ST. ZACHARY

settled the discussion, and that it was now acknowledged
at Monte Cassino that the relics of St. Benedict which
we were shown in the crypt were really the body of the
great patriarch of Monasticism in the West! To those
who are disposed to sneer at such lengthy and ardent
discussion on such subjects, and to brand them as sterile,
we would point out that this and similar disputes have
at least done a very great deal to sift the sources of
history, and have even led to historical discoveries.’
Into the arena of this controversy we have no thought
of entering, either to take sides or even to arbitrate. The
monks of St. Benedict are doughty literary champions,
and we will leave them to settle their literary difficulties
themselves. We will simply observe that if the bull of
Pope Zachary, Omnzpotenti Deo, can be urged as proving *
that the body of St. Benedict was at Monte Cassino on
the date of its publication (748), there is a letter of the
same Pope, written in 750-1, and seemingly more likely
to be genuine® than the aforesaid bull, in which he exhorts
the clergy of France to cause the body of St. Benedict to
be restored whence it had been taken. Of the rest of this
letter, which treats of Pippin and Grifo, something will

1882. Bartolini, p. 259f., gives the arguments in favour of the body
never having been removed.

1 The controversy of which we have been speaking is said to have
revealed the existence of a certain Clovis III., who reigned in Neustria
c. 672-677; cf Hist. de Clovis IIT, (the programme of a work in
preparation—whether the complete work was published I know not),
par C. Grellet-Balguerie, Orleans, 1882.

2 “Qualiter autem ejusdem patris (Benedicti) pignora .... sint
posita perspicientes ac intemerata invenientes, pro reverentia tanti
patris tangere minime ausi sumus.” Ap. Bartolini, p. (58).

3 It is regarded as such by its latest editor, Gundlach, ap. JZ. G.
Epp, iti. 467.

* J6. “Ipsum (Benedictum) ad suum reverti tumulum, ex quo clam
tultus est.”

ST. ZACHARY 261

be said when Zachary’s connections with the Franks
come to be treated of.

Now that a beginning has been made of treating of the Zachary
work of Church restoration by Zachary, it will be con- ia
venient to mention here the rest of his labours in that”
direction. For though “in his days! the people entrusted
to him by God lived in peace and happiness,” there was
so much to be done, in the way of keeping existing
monuments in repair, that even an energetic Pope, such as
Zachary, had no time to think of adding new ones. His
first care was the Lateran Palace, which he practically
rebuilt.2 From the days of John VII., who built the
new palace beneath the Palatine—the finding of the
ruins of which has already been described—evidently
no great attention had been paid to the old Lateran
palace. The work of Zachary, no doubt, saved it from
going to complete decay. It “contained the archives
of the Church and the Treasure Chamber? and was the
dwelling, at the same time, of the popes and _ their
households. Enlarged by degrees, it included, besides
the great basilica, several smaller churches, many oratories,
triclinia or dining halls, and several chapels, among
them the celebrated private chapel of the popes, called
St. Lorenzo, or, later, Sancta Sanctorum.”* In addition
to the ordinary decorations, such as mosaics, paintings
and images, with which the Pope adorned the Lateran,
he had painted a large fresco’ map of the world, which
doubtless furnished Giovanni da Udine with the idea for

aE er WO Vit,

2 76. “QOmne patriarchium pene a novo restauravit. In magna
enim penuria eundem locum invenerat.”

2 76, “Ubi etiam et omnem substantiam suam per manus Ambrosii
primicerii notariorum introduci mandavit.”

4 Gregorovius, ii. 268. Cf Bartolini, p. 208f. and p. 418 f.

6 “Et orbis terrarum descriptionem depinxit,” 2,

262 ST, ZACHARY

those similar maps that now adorn one of the loggias of
the Vatican.

Among the gifts presented by Zachary to the basilica
of St. Peter were his own copies of the Psalter, the
antiphonary of St. Gregory and the lives of the saints
which are recited at Matins. One of these is still
preserved in the Vatican Library.t

Discovery Of special interest to us in this country was the
rae 24 finding of the head of St. George. Probably whilst some
George repairs were in progress at the Lateran palace, a box
was discovered in which was found a skull, which, from
an attached label in Greek characters, was shown to
be the head of St. George. With great joy both
pastor and people assembled at the Lateran. With
hymns and canticles the sacred relic was transported
by the Pope’s orders to the deaconry (diaconia) of St.
George (in the second region of the city), known as ‘ad
Velum aureum’ (Velabro).2 The mention of St. George
in Velabro belonging to the second region of the city
shows us that at least part of the tenth imperial region
—(the Palatine Region)—was included in the second
ecclesiastical region.2 The church of the deaconry was
completely restored by the Pope, and placed in charge
of some Greek monks of the order of St. Basil, who had
fled to Rome to escape the persecution of the Iconoclast

1 Bartolini, p. 213 note.

* “Tn venerabili Patriarchio sacratissimum b. Georgii M. Papa in
capsa reconditum reperit caput, in quo et pictacium invenit pariter
litteris exaratum greecis, ipsum esse significantes.” JZ. P., 7. The
diaconal Church of St. George in Velabro was the titular church of
our great Cardinal Newman, who was a cardinal deacon.

* Cf. Gregorov., i. p. 48 and p, 81. On the later page Gregorovius
says that the second ecclesiastical region covered, roughly speaking, the
second and eighth imperial regions. From the above extract it is
perfectly plain that at least a part of the tenth imperial region was also
included in the second ecclesiastical region, Vide sup., Pt. I. p. 42 n.

ST. ZACHARY 263

Copronymus. These monks were very naturally chosen
by Zachary, as St. George was one of the chief patron
saints of the Greeks. Various inscriptions, still to be
seen in this old basilica of St. George, recall the memory
of the Greek Egumeni (abbots), who in the eighth and
ninth centuries had charge of the church.!

To go further into Zachary’s work in the direction of
Church restoration and decoration would be to trench on
the office of the archzeologist and the antiquarian. Re-
ferring, therefore, our readers to the Book of the Popes, and
the learned comments of Bartolini,? it will be worth while
to add a word or two on his efforts as a landlord to im-
prove the cultivation of the Roman Campagna.

The Campagna, a low-lying plain round Rome, some Domus
ninety miles in length and some thirty, from the sea to ea
the Sabine and Alban hills, in breadth, was never at the
best of times a very healthy district. But at the period
of which we are now writing, what with the devastations
of the Huns and other barbarians, who broke up the
Roman empire and sacked its capital, what with the wars
of Belisarius and Narses for the recovery of Italy from
the barbarian Goth, and the various attacks on Rome by
the Lombards, the state of the Campagna was rapidly
approaching that desolate and disease-producing condition
in which we see it to-day. Zachary, however, profiting
by a year or two of peace, turned his attention to promote
measures that might effect something in the way of re-
tarding the destruction of the fertility of the Campagna,
which he saw was but too rapidly going on. He
accordingly established agricultural colonies—known as
‘domus culte ’—at suitable places. Dwellings and oratories

1 Cf. Bartolini, p. 419f., on St. George, and the history of the basilica
of this name 27 Velaéro, etc,

2.P. 574,

Zachary
and the
Franks.

264 ST. ZACHARY

or small churches were provided; and every effort was
made by the Pope to induce men to settle there, and to
procure by purchase sufficient land in their neighbour-
hood to give the colonists plenty of employment. The
Liber Pontificalis gives us the names of five such colonies.
One that went by the name of St. Cecily+ was situated
five miles from Rome on the Tiburtine road, and was
incorporated with the Tiburtine ‘patrimony, which in-
cluded all the country between the Via Prznestina and
the Tiber. A second was founded some fourteen miles
from Rome in the Etruscan patrimony that stretched
along the right bank of the Tiber. This ‘colony’ lay
between the Claudian and Cornelian roads. Laurentum,
now Capocotta, was the third; and Antius and Formia,
in the old Volscian territory, constituted the fourth and
fifth, When the work of founding these agricultural
colonies was accomplished, Zachary summoned a synod
of the clergy of the Roman Church, declared before it
that he had added the said colonies to the patrimonies
and dominion of St. Peter, and forbade their alienation
by any of his successors or by any other person whatso-
ever.

Of the regular intercourse which Zachary maintained
with the Franks, very little has come down to us. The

1 “Qua domus culta, S. Cecilize usque in hodiernum diem vocatur.”
I. P. It may be again noted that a ‘patrimony’ consisted of a
number of ‘masse, and that each ‘massa’ was in turn a collection
of a number of farms ; was an estate in other words. Cf Z. P., and
Bartolini, p. 539 f.; Gregorovius, ii. 270.

2 I. P. Some extracts from the ‘registers’ of Zachary have been
preserved, which show at what rent and to whom he leased some of
the estates of the Church. Cf. Bartolini, 551 f., and Jaffé, Regest., No.
1760-1765, 1st ed. The extracts were preserved in an abstract of
Gregory II., and Zachary’s, etc., registers made by Cardinal Deusdedit
in the eleventh century. It should be stated that the sites above
assigned to the domus cultz are not altogether free from doubt,

ST. ZACHARY 265

Caroline Code has preserved only one of his letters,
addressed to “the most excellent and most Christian
Pippin, Major Domus, to all our most beloved bishops
and religious abbots, and to all the God-fearing princes
of the Franks.” This document furnishes a series of
replies to questions on various points of the canon and
moral laws, sent to him for solution by Pippin, acting
on the advice of Frankish bishops. The Pope gives his
answers in accordance with the tradition of the Fathers,
the authority of the canons, and his own decrees, which
he has issued by his apostolical power.! Further, the
letters of St. Boniface reveal the fact that Zachary vigor-
ously co-operated with that great apostle of the Germans
by securing for him the active support of the Franks.
And lastly, a letter already alluded to, a letter of which
the authenticity has been questioned on seemingly
insufficient grounds, shows him in that rédle of peace-
maker which he knew so well how to play. The brothers
Pippin and Carlomann lived on the best of terms after
the death of their father Charles Martel. But this was
not the case with their half-brother Grifo, the son,
whether legitimate or otherwise is not known, of Charles
Martel and the Bavarian princess Swanahild. Whether
Grifo was dissatisfied with the share of power left to him
by his father, or whether the two brothers were jealous
of what had been done for Grifo, certain it is that war
ere long broke out between the latter and his half-brothers.
Grifo was soon subdued and imprisoned (741). When
Carlomann renounced the world, Pippin released Grifo
(747). It was kindness thrown away. Grifo was soon
in arms again. And once more did the sword fail him.
It was at this juncture that the Pope intervened (750-1).

1 Ep. 3 G. We have replied in accordance with “quod Deo
inspirante apostolica auctoritate decernere potuimus (etiam et nos).”

266 ST. ZACHARY

He implored the clergy to add their efforts for peace?
to those which were being made by the monks whom
Optatus, the abbot of Monte Cassino, and his princely
subject, Carlomann, had sent to the court of the Major
Domus, Pippin. It is, to say the least, likely enough
that this mediation saved Grifo. Yet once more was he
forgiven by the generous Pippin. But Grifo was imper-
vious to kindness, and it was while scheming with Pippin’s
foes, Tassilo of Bavaria, and Aistulf, the king of the
Lombards, that he was slain by some of Pippin’s followers
(753).

Though the authority is anything but contemporary,
the Annals of Metz (not written till towards the close of
the tenth century) are probably but relating a fact when
they tell of a rebellion of Otilo (the predecessor of Tassilo
III.), against Pippin. The Bavarian dukes were ever
chafing against the yoke of the Franks, and consequently
they were frequently in arms against them. They were
invariably worsted. And so on the banks of the Lech,
Otilo was defeated by Pippin and Carlomann in 743.
In the fight there was captured on the side of Otilo the
priest Sergius, the missus of Pope Zachary. The same
authority says that on the day before the battle he had
been sent by Otilo to the Franks, and, pretending to
speak? in the name of the Pope, had forbidden the battle
and ordered the Franks to depart from Bavaria. When
Sergius fell into the hands of Pippin and his brother,
they took good care to impress upon him that he could
not have been speaking in St. Peter’s name, because it
was by the intercession of Blessed Peter and the just

1 Ep. Zach., ap. M. G. Epp., iii. 467. “Ut ad pacis concordiam
redeant, vobis (episcopis) propter Deum pacifice mediantibus.”

2 “¥Falsoque ex auctoritate D. Apostolici bellum interdixerat,”
Ann. Mettenses, an. 743, ap. M. G. SS., i,

ST. ZACHARY 267

judgment of God that they had been victorious, and that
“Bavaria and the Bavarians were to belong to the empire
of the Franks!” We may conclude that the Aunals had
no authority for much more than the fact of the Pope’s
attempted mediation between the combatants.

But the most important of Pope Zachary’s relations cae
with the Franks, —indeed, one of the most memorable events the deposi-
in the history of the popes of the Middle Ages up to this Childerie
date—was his decision with regard to the election of Pippin oie) IIL,
to the throne of the Frankish empire in place of Childeric, ™
No action of the medizeval popes up to this period has
been more discussed or more variously viewed. While
some writers would condemn the conduct of the Pope,
others would approve of it; and there are those who would
minimise and those who would perhaps magnify its impor-
tance. Before entering upon the details of the matter, there
are one or two points which unquestionably stand out from
the historical documents of the period. The number of
writers who speak of it—both at the time and in the years
more immediately following the event—shows unmistakably
that the affair was then regarded as one of no mean im-
portance; and the way in which it is spoken of by these
writers shows that the appeal to the Pope and his judg-
ment on the matter were looked on at the time as most
natural, This is a very important point to bear in mind,
first because many are apt to judge of the doings of men in
the past by the different laws and the different recognised
criteria of judgment of the present day; and again because
we have not such a deep knowledge of the facts of the
case as to warrant us in forming a different judgment on
it to that formed by the historians and men of the time.

What are the facts of the case as they have come down
to us, it will be our task now to set forth with but as little
admixture of comment of our own as need be. The

268 ST. ZACHARY

later descendants! of the kings of the Merovingian race
were men practically without vigour of mind or body. All
real power slipped or was plucked from their feeble grasp.
While they were once a year saluted as kings, throughout
all the year the so-called mayors of the palace were
looked up to as kings, and had in reality all the power
of kings.

Originally only ‘masters of the household, they were,
at the time of which we are now speaking, the chief
ministers of the kingdom, and had control over the chief
departments of the State. Such an important place
did they occupy that even before the declaration of
Pope Zachary we sometimes find them spoken of simply
as kings. And so Desiderius, Bishop of Cahors, addresses
(c. 650, ep. i. 6) Grimoald, the son of Pippin ‘of Landen,’
and mayor of the palace in the kingdom of Austrasia,
as “the ruler not only of the royal court but of the
kingdom” —/otzus aule tmmoque regni rectorem.

The nominal king of the Franks in the year 752 was
Childeric III., one of the weakest of the weak. He is
described as a man of ‘not the slightest account,’ ? ‘of
no sense, ? ‘as useless and good for nothing.’* It does
not require any deep political insight to see that such
a condition of things was to the last degree dangerous
to a State. And the danger was intensified at this period

1 Reges “Francorum qui ex stirpe regia erant, et reges appella-
bantur, .... potestatem vero regiam penitus nullam habebant, sed
quod Major domus Francorum volebat, hoc faciebant” is the language
of the contemporary Axnales Lauris. minor., ap. Pertz, MZ. G. H., i.
To the same effect speak the Annales Lauris. and Fuld.; Regino in
his Chronicle (all ap. Pertz, 2.) ; and especially Eginhard in his Zz/e of
Charlemagne, c. 4 (Eng. trans., p. 26).

2 “VHildericus levis nimis” (Annal. Quedlinburg., ap. Pertz, iii.)

3 “Tnsensatus” (Ademar, /7sz,, ii.; 20., iv.).

* “Vir inutilis ac remissus,..., et ineptus.” Ugo of Fleury
FHitst., 20., ix,

ST. ZACHARY 269

by the rebellions of Grifo,! Pippin’s half-brother.
Among the Franks, as among the Anglo-Saxons, the
monarchy was at least so far elective that it lay with
the nobles to choose their kings from amongst the various
members of the royal family. And the records of both
peoples show that the eldest sons did not always succeed
to their fathers’ thrones. Matters had now come to
such a pass with the Merovingian race, from a continued
succession of mere boys, that there does not appear to
have been at the time of Childeric III. any member of
that family worthy of holding the kingly power, at any
rate in comparison with such ‘mayors of the palace’
as Charles Martel and Pippin the Short. Consequently
the chief men of the Franks, both cleric and lay, felt that
the interests of their country imperatively demanded a
change. There can be no difficulty in believing that
Pippin helped on their deliberations, and named himself
as the most fitting man both to be and to be called king.”
But it is equally clear, from the quiet way in which the
resolution that actually made him king was accomplished,
that his pretensions were regarded as just by the nobles
at large. However, though themselves convinced that
it was within their power and right for sufficient reason
to depose one sovereign and replace him by another,
they were men of sense, and understood well enough
that their contemplated action might form a dangerous
precedent. And so, knowing that no one is a judge in
his own case, and that they might be deceived in supposing
they had reason enough to dethrone Childeric, they re-
solved to get the opinion and decision of another on the

1 Cf. Ann. Metens.; Hodgkin, Italy, vii. 96, 120.

2 “ Pepin inheriting his father Charles Martel’s talents and ambition,
made, in the name, and with the consent of the nation, a solemn
reference to Pope Zacharias, as to the deposition of Childeric III.”
(Hallam, Europe during the Middle Ages, 4th ed., p. 12.)

270 ST. ZACHARY

‘merits of their proposed conduct. To whom, then, could
they turn more naturally on this, which was as much
a question of morals as of politics, than to the Pope, to
whom they looked up not only as the author of their
Christianity, but as the representative of Our Lord on
earth, and so the chief pastor of all Christians?
Arguing from the fact that one of those sent by
Pippin to consult Zachary on his wishes was Burchard,
Bishop of Wurtzburg, one of St. Boniface’s friends, that
according to many ancient authors, Boniface anointed
Pippin as king, and that in 751 Boniface sent? Lul
to Rome to discuss some secret matters with the Pope,
not a few authors think it by no means improbable
that St. Boniface was the chief of Pippin’s supporters
and advisers in the contemplated revolution. However
that may be, it is certain that there went to Rome
(probably at the close of the year 751) two ambassadors
from Pippin, and ‘the whole nobility of the Franks,’ ?
viz., Burchard, Bishop of Wurtzburg, and Fulrad, Pippin’s
chaplain, charged to ask the Pope whether it was a
desirable state of things that there should be in France
men who with the name of king had no regal power.
To this Zachary gave an.authoritative reply that it was
better, under the circumstances, that he should be and
should be called king who had the power of a king rather
than the one who had the name without the substance

? Bonif., ep. 141, ed. S.; ep. 86 D. “Habet (Lul) secreta queedam
mea, quz soli pietati vestree profiteri debet.” Zachary, in his answer,
Nov. 4, 751, says he has in return given both verbal and written
answers. “De quibus Zam zn verbo responsum dantes, et per scripta
tuze remisimus fraternitati,” 142 S.; 87 D.

2 “Una cum consilio et consensu omnium Francorum”—from an
addition to the Chronicle of /vedegard (a work written in the days of
Pippin), found by Cardinal Bartolini (pp. 506-7) in a Vatican MS,
known as Cod. No. 213 of Queen Christina of Sweden.

ST. ZACHARY 271

of a king. Accordingly, “that the good order! of the
Christian world might not be disturbed,’ he “ordered
by his apostolic? authority that Pippin should be made
king,” and “that Archbishop Boniface should anoint
him.”® The decision of the Pope was followed by the
public election of Pippin; and, raised on a shield amidst
the applause of his cheering comrades, he was by them
hailed as king, after in a most solemn manner he had
been anointed king at Soissons by Boniface and other
assistant bishops (752). As will be noticed in its proper
place, Pippin was again anointed (754) by Pope Stephen
(II.) III. Childeric was tonsured and shut up in the
monastery of St. Bertin in Sithiu, founded by St. Omer (or
Audomar). His wife and son were also enclosed in convents.

As the history of this appeal is so important, our readers A word
might perchance care to know a little more about the cata
authorities on which it rests than can be gathered from for ey
the preceding notes, Besides the testimony of the so-“*™
called Aznales minores* of Lauresheim, which chronicle
the events between the years 741 and 788, there are
those of the Anunals® of Laureshetm, and those, so-called,
of Eginhard.6 Concerning these two latter, the illustri-
ous Pertz gives’ it as his opinion that the annals of
Lauresheim were composed in the monastery of Nazarius,
and only reached down to the year 788; that they after-
wards came into the hands of Eginhard, the biographer
of Charlemagne, who continued them to the year 829; and

1 “Ne perturbaretur Christianitatis ordo,” Regino, Chrom., ad an.

749, ap. Pertz, 7. G. A, i.: “ut non conturbaretur ordo,” Aznal.
Lauris., ad an. 749, 20.
2 “Zacharias .... per auctoritatem Apostolicam juss¢¢ Pipinum

regem fieri,” Annal. Lauris., ubt sup.

3 “A Sancto Bonifacio Archiepiscopo Moguntino jzsswz prefati
Papze in Regem inungitur,” from a document also found in the above
codex. Ap. Bartolini, p. 507.

SApe crt) Gas; 1. Lf: DIE), DMRS F985 2 2

272 ST. ZACHARY

that finally, after the earlier part, the work of the monks,
had received some emendations from him, the whole
chronicle (741-829), with a few slight changes in his
continuation, was edited as the Aznals of Eginhard.
The evidence of these contemporary chronicles is supported
by a host! of others, and is if possible excelled by one or
two other documents now to be adduced. In an old MS.
codex, containing the works of St. Gregory of Tours, De
vitis patrum and De gloria confessorum, found.in the
abbey of St. Denis, near Paris, there was discovered, in
the same characters, and written with the same ink* as
the rest of the MS., the following interesting note by the
scribe who wrote the MS:—“If, reader, you would care
to know when this work in praise of the holy martyrs was
written, it was in the year of Our Lord 767, during the
sixteenth year of the reign of the most happy, peaceful,
and Catholic Pippin, king of the Franks, and patrician
of the Romans, in the fifth indiction.... The aforesaid
most flourishing Lord Pippin, Pious King, was raised to
the regal throne by the authority and command (zmperium)
of the Lord Pope Zachary of holy memory, by the
anointing with the sacred chrism at the hands of the
holy bishops of Gaul and by the election of all the Franks
three years before.”? As Bartolini takes notice,t the

1 Ap. Bartolini, pp. 449-462, 496-529 ; Jungmann, Déssert. in H. E.,
xiv. In all these chronicles the authoritative action of the Pope is
brought out with every variety of expression—mandavit, data auctoritate
sua, jussit, decreto, per auctoritatem apostolicam, etc.

2 A very important point in determining the authenticity of MSS.
Cf. the Chronology of Inks, an interesting little article in the
Bessarione, No. 1, May 1896. ‘This is a small periodical issued at
Rome and Siena on Oriental studies.

8 This note was originally edited by Papebrock and Henschenius,
the Bollandists (Exeg. Prelim. A. SS., tom. iii. Martii, p. xxii), then
by Mabillon, De ve diplomat., v. 354; L. P.,i. 458; WM. G. SS., xv. p. 1.
It is often spoken of as the clausula Pippini

“PA BOO

ST. ZACHARY 273

epithets, ‘most flourishing, etc, give us internal evidence
that the scribe was contemporary with Pippin, as does
also the title ‘Lord’ (Domnus) applied to Zachary, for it
shows that that Pope must have been but comparatively
recently dead. Another contemporary writer, cited by
the above-named distinguished author from an inedited
Vatican MS. (Reg. Sueciz,! No. 213), speaks quite to the
same effect when he says,? that with the advice and con-
sent of all the Franks an embassy was sent to Rome;
and that on the receipt of the apostolic mandate Pippin
was raised to the throne according to the ancient rite, by
the election of the Franks, the consecration of the bishops,
and the homage (swdjectio) of the nobles (prznczpes).

From the contemporary authorities, which the reader
now has before him, he can have no difficulty in
concluding that the Pope intervened actively in Pippin’s
elevation, and that, as results showed, his intervention was
most salutary. An important revolution of the greatest
benefit for Church and State was thus brought about
without the slightest disorder. A strong government
was established, under which civilisation, which, if true,
means improvement in the welfare of the people from all
points of view, made considerable progress in Western
Europe. Only sticklers for “the right divine of kings to
govern wrong” (which right, we believe, in the eyes of
sound thinking men, does not exist) could object to
Zachary’s decision, a decision the lawfulness of which was
not called in question by any of his contemporaries, Well

1 A short life of this illustrious convert and extraordinary woman,
whose collection of MSS. made such a splendid addition to the
Vatican library, was published by Richardson of London (1862), under
the title of Christina, Queen of Sweden, a brief notice of her life,
conversion and death, by M. T.

2 This and another extract from the same codex from Bartolini,
ps0:

VOL MP nett, 18

274 ST. ZACHARY

would it be for modern Europe if its rulers would refer
their differences or their difficulties to the popes once
again! Their disagreements would lead to much less

fatal results.

Zachary Not much remains to be told of the doings of this
Scone ote great Greek pontiff. In reply? to a letter of Theodore,

regard to 3 : A -
spiritual Bishop of Pavia, he forbids a son to marry a girl to whom

esi his father has stood as godparent, a decision that was
eens inserted among the decretals on the subjects of spiritual

ee relationship, and was consequently the law of the Church
750-752 for a long time. By the Council of Trent, however,
spiritual relationship was limited to the first degree—ze.,
to the godparents themselves and to their godchildren
and their godchildren’s natural parents, as well as to the
baptiser, the baptised, and the parents of the baptised.
Zealous for the preservation of order, we find Zachary
in the last year of his life condemning? Ausfred, Bishop
of Siena, for presuming to consecrate an altar in the
Church of St. Ampsanus against the wishes of the Bishop
of Arezzo, under whose jurisdiction the said church was.
The bishops of Siena, however, as the Church was within
the limits of their diocese, thought that sufficient attention
had not been paid to their side of the question. The case
reappeared again at intervals even till the beginning of
the eleventh century (1029).
ae In the midst of all the weighty matters of Church and
State in which Zachary was ever immersed, to the great
profit of both, he found time, like his great model the first

1 Would that the example of Prince Bismarck in referring to
Leo XIII. his dispute with the Spanish government relative to the
Caroline Islands were to be universally followed !

2 The text of the letter in Bartolini, p. (77); in Italian, p. 412.
Mansi., xil.

3 This we learn from a bull of Pope Stephen (II.) III., ap. Bartolini,
p. (86).

ST. ZACHARY 275

Gregory, for deeds of charity and for literary pursuits,
Not only did he cause food from his own table to be taken
by the masters of his household (faracellari?) to the poor
and pilgrims who dwelt in the hospitals in the neighbour-
hood of St. Peter's, but looked after the poor and sick of
the whole city! And like a true bishop he showed in a
most substantial way that he had a genuine love of his
clergy ; was, indeed, their father. Justly regarding it as
an important point that the clergy should be in such a
position as to appear respectable in the eyes of everyone,
he more than doubled the donative (voga or presbytertum)
which the popes were wont to bestow on the Roman
clergy once a year, in addition to the regular revenues
they derived from the property belonging to the Church
(tttulus) to which they were attached. This was called
‘one donative’ (vega una), because, as Bartolini observes,?
it was granted once a year. His biographer might well
say® of Zachary that he would not suffer anyone to be in
distress.

In the department of literature we know* that he Translates
translated the Dzalogues of St. Gregory I. into Greek, and ee
we have the authority of the heresiarch Photius that 6 St Gregory
to the general gain, he translated many other of his works
in addition.

Zachary, the great and good, went the way of all flesh, pesto
March 752.
1 “Necnon ut omnibus et inopibus et infirmis, per universas regiones
istius Romanze Urbis constitutis, curiose distribuerentur” — statuit
alimentorum sumptus. LZ. P.
2 P. 562. The cardinal naively contrasts the inferior revenues of
the cardinal priests of to-day with those of the same dignitaries of the
eighth century, and supposes that the distribution of medals on the
feast of SS. Peter and Paul has now to serve them as a roga!
3 “QOmnes utpote pater. ... amplectens .... et quempiam
tribulari minime permittens.” JZ. P.
4 Z. P,, and John the Deacon, in vit., iv. 75.
5 Bib. cod. 252, cited by Bartolini.

Zachary
coins
money,

276 ST. ZACHARY

March 14 or 22, 752, and was buried in St. Peter’s the
following day. His name is to be found inscribed among the
saints in the earliest martyrologies that are extant, written
after his death, such as those of Ado and Usuard. In the
Roman martyrology he is commemorated on March 15.

To serve as a natural introduction to a few words on
the temporal power of the popes at this period, mention of
one act of Zachary has been hitherto delayed. The act re-
ferred to is the fact of his having issued money bearing
his own name.

After the Romans threw off their allegiance to the
emperor Leo in the reign of Pope Gregory II. it is only
natural to conclude that the need for new coins would have
to be met, as of course the supply from the mints of Con-
stantinople would cease. The need for coins of small value
would probably be the first felt. The smaller coins would
be the ones in the most constant use—for the Rome
of this age especially must have been a city of poor—
and consequently from this cause, and from the very
fact of their small value, would be soonest lost. Though
there is extant! a silver coin that bears no name, and
which may belong to an issue of St. Gregory II., small
square bronze coins of Gregory III. are, as far as we
know, the first that were struck by order of a Pope. The
coins that we have of Pope Zachary are also small, square

1 Cf. Studi Storict tntorno ad alcune prime monete Papal, by
Pizzamiglio, Rome, 1876, p. 23f. An engraving of the coin referred to
will be found at the end of the Szzaz, etc.

2 Cf. Bartolini, p. 62 f.; Pizzamiglio, p. 26f.; and Le monete det Papi,
by Cinagli, p. 1. Plates of the coins of Gregory III. and Zachary are
given by all these writers. Pizzamiglio, following the distinguished
numismatist D. Promis, notes (p. 6) that from the Middle Ages to the
days of its last issue in our own times the papal coinage was the finest in
Italy. And that on many counts, viz., the centuries during which it has
been minted, its numbers, the history and antiquities it illustrates, and
its beauty, as well from the excellence and variety of the dies from
which it has been struck as from the elegance of its legends.

ST. ZACHARY 277

and bronze; for a silver coin that is shown bearing the
name of Zachary is acknowledged on all hands to be
spurious. On the obverse of the coins of Zachary, enclosed
in a circlet of raised dots, and with an initial cross, we
have the letters ZACCHARIAE, and on the reverse,
with the same circlet and cross, the letters PAPAE.
These coins, both of Gregory III. and Zachary, are in
the Kircherian Museum at Rome. According to Cinagli,
the coin of Zachary there preserved weighs 27°51 Roman
grammes, or 1°35 French.

Since writing the above, a visit to Rome has furnished
facts which render necessary a modification of the preced-
ing paragraph. There are no longer any papal coins in
the Kircherian Museum. When the Italian government
seized the Gregorian University buildings, in which was
the Museum founded by the Jesuit, Father Kircher—an
act of robbery with violence which is glossed over by
saying that the buildings were made xatzonal property—
the papal coins which used to be there were transferred
to the Museo delle Terme. But the cozws of Gregory III.,
etc., are not forthcoming. It may be that after the con-
fusion caused by transportation has been remedied they
will be found. As it is, however, the obliging director of
the Museum, Cavaliere Pasqui, informed us that at present
the zational collection of papal coins does not go further
back than Gregory IV.

Specimens of the said cotus were, however, seen by us
in the Vatican collection of papal coins, which, through
the great kindness of Signor Serafini, who is the director
as well of the Vatican collection of coins as of the
Municipal, we were able to examine. Through the recent
purchase of the collection of Cardinal Randi, the Vatican
has now the finest collection of papal coins in the world.
It is composed of over 30,000 specimens, of which

278 ST. ZACHARY

16,000! are different. Whatever may be thought of the cozns
of the popes before Hadrian I., the series of papal coins un-
questionably begins with him and goes down till towards the
middle of the twelfth century. Coins of Pascal II. (1099-
1118) exist in the Vatican and elsewhere. Then, for about
a century and a half, money in Rome was struck by the
Senate. During that period, though at the height of their
power abroad, the popes had not much of it at home.
From Blessed Benedict XI. (1303-5) to our own times
(Pius IX.) there is an unbroken series of papal money.
The Senate (1252) were the first to strike money in gold.
They also coined in silver, copper and in some alloy. The
papal coins, however, from Hadrian I. to Pascal II. are all
in silver?; and so, as the cozws of Gregory III. and Zachary
are of copper, and for the most part square, Promis and
Serafini, whose opinion is entitled to very great respect,
believe that they are only ¢Zesserg, and were used for
the same purposes as our soup-tickets. Still, the appear-
ance of such pieces of stamped metal for the first time,
just when political considerations would lead one to
expect to find traces of a papal coinage, is so striking
that we cannot but subscribe to the view of Pizzamiglio,
and maintain that they are the first essays of the popes
in the direction of coining money. Even if they are
regarded as desser@, they must be considered as having
the relation to money that bank notes have.

1 Cinaghi (Monete det Papi) only notices 8000 specimens. To repeat
with Promis (Mfonete det R. P., p. 5), the collection of papal coins
constitutes “la pit ricca e bella serie di monete che vanti Europa.”

2 The Lower, or Later-Roman Empire issued very few copper coins.
See the carefully executed work of Hill, Greek and Roman Coins.
Macmillan, 1902.

° He refutes the arguments of Promis, p. 28f. Among other points,
Pizzamiglio shows that the square shape of the cozms of Gregory, etc., is to

be seen in other monies of the period, and that money of that shape is
noticed in the Code of Justinian. Cf Mov. constit., Nov. 105, ¢. 2, n. I.

ST. ZACHARY 279

Now if there is one thing that history makes clear, it is
that whoso coins the money in a State holds, practically at
least, the supreme power in that State. A prince always
justly considered himself as practically independent of any
central government if he issued his own money; and, on
the other hand, it has ever been the aim of such as have
wished to extend their sway to reserve to themselves
the sole right of coining money throughout the terri-
tories they wished to claim as theirs. The fact, then, that
Gregory III. and Zachary issued a coinage of their own,
shows us that at this point in the eighth century the civil
rulers of the city of Rome were the popes and not the
emperors ; for it has never been contended that any special
permit to coin money was given them by the rulers at
Constantinople.

So much passion and prejudice is generally brought to
bear on this subject of the temporal power of the popes,
that it behoves us to approach it with the greatest circum-
spection. Some half century ago the non-Catholic writers
of the Cabinet Cyclopedia of History did not hesitate to
declare! that “modern writers especially, speaking of the
Papacy, had almost always aimed at perverting the truth
of history, and that in no country under heaven has this
abominable dishonesty been so prevalent as in England.”
Though, with the rapid publication of original documents
that has of late years gone on in the more advanced
nations of Europe, and with much greater and deeper
attention on the part of the ‘many’ to historical studies,
this damning charge stands in need of some modifica-
tion, there is still much truth in it. And even yet many
writers cannot bring themselves to speak on the popes,
and especially on their temporal power, in accordance
with a fair temperate deduction from historical facts.

1 Hist. of the Germanic Empire, i. 147, ed. Cabinet Cyc.

ihe
temporal
power of
the popes,

280 ST. ZACHARY

In considering this question of the temporal power of
the popes, it may be well first again to emphasise the facts
of the case and then to enquire into their causes. As a
matter of fact, then, there can be no doubt that from the
days of Gregory II. Rome was to all intents and purposes
independent of the emperors and subject to the popes.
On this point of fact there is abundance of non-Catholic
testimony. Though the supremacy of the Eastern Empire
was still recognised, says Finlay,! “from this time, A.D. 733,
the city of Rome enjoyed political independence under
the guidance and protection of the popes.”

There is by no means so much agreement as to the
cause or causes that brought about this temporal sway of
the popes over the Roman duchy. Many non-Catholic
writers ascribe it to the bad ambition of the popes them-
selves in this age. At this conclusion they can but arrive

1 History of the Byzantine Empire, p.50; Hallam, Zurope during
the Middle Ages, p. 15, note 2. “There can be no question that a
considerable share of jurisdiction and authority was practically exer-
cised by the popes during this period.” Even Proctor (History of
Italy, p. 11) says the “controversy on image worship gave the next
great impulse to the grandeur of the popedom, and gifted it with
independent temporal authority over the city of Rome.” Another
writer says the same: “ For it was in revolt against his (Leo’s) tyranny
that the Roman people-voluntarily submitted to become subjects of the
Holy See” (A Hist. of Med. Christianity in Italy, by C. J. Hemans,
p. 2). Hear Gibbon, Decline and Fall, iii. c. 49, pp. 362-3: “The
liberty of Rome, which had been oppressed by the arms and arts of
Augustus, was rescued, after 750 years of servitude, from the persecu-
tion of Leo the Isaurian, . . . His (the Pope’s) alms, his sermons, his
correspondence with the kings and prelates of the West, his recent
services, their gratitude, an oath, accustomed the Romans to consider
him as the first magistrate or Zrémce of the city. . . . Their temporal
dominion is now confirmed by the reverence of a thousand years, and
their noblest title is the free choice of a people whom they had
redeemed from slavery!” “Henceforth,” says Milman (Azsz. of Lat.
Christ., ii. p. 431), not very clearly it must be confessed, “the Pope, if
not yet a temporal sovereign, is a temporal potentate.” Cj Gregorovius
(Hist. of City of Rome, ii. 246) on Greg. III., cited above ; James,
Life of Charlemagne, p. 72, etc.

ST. ZACHARY 281

by imputing evil motives (knowledge of which they can
only draw from their imaginations) to acts which, simply
considered as history presents them, are quite innocent.
But anyone who may have taken the trouble to read the
preceding pages will, we imagine, have seen for himself
that practically independent temporal power did not come
to the popes all at once in the eighth century, but that
civil authority gradually accumulated in their hands from
the days of Pope Gregory I.; and, as will be shown
presently, long before his time. It will, doubtless, have
been observed how, from the unwillingness or incapability
of others, it naturally fell to the popes to take measures
for the defence of the Roman duchy, and how in time,
equally naturally, the people of Rome at last came to
recognise only those as their rulers who had proved them-
selves their sole preservers. We say it fell naturally to
the popes, inasmuch as they were the most distinguished
men in Rome, as well from the material resources at their
command, as, of course, still more from the regard had by
the people to their spiritual power.t On the other hand,
if the power of the Eastern emperors had been greater,
had they honestly done their best for their Italian provinces,
instead of endeavouring to use them merely as a means
to raise money, or as an area through which their dogmatic

1 Non-Catholic writers do not hesitate to declare that the bishop of
Rome was, as early as the second century, acknowledged as Head of
the Church Universal, and contend that “this fact cannot be contro-
verted; it has been acknowledged from the time of Irenzeus and
Cyprian, whose works contain abundant evidence of the spiritual
supremacy of the popes” (Europe in the Middle Ages, i. 143, ed.
Cabinet Cyclop.). Writing of the beginning of the eighth century,
Finlay, History of the Byzantine Empire, p. 46, says: “The Pope of
Rome had long been regarded by orthodox Christians as the head of
the Church ; even the Greeks admitted his right of inspection over the
whole body of the clergy, in virtue of the superior dignity of the Roman
See.” For this last statement he quotes Sozomen (Z. Z£.,, iii. 8), a
writer of the fifth century.

Gradual
growth

of the
“temporal
power’ of
the popes,

282 ST. ZACHARY

edicts had to be propagated, there would, humanly speak-
ing, have been no independent temporal power in the
hands of the popes. For certainly the popes never tried
to throw off the yoke of the Eastern Empire.

It has just been said that temporal power began to
be exercised by the popes even long before the days of
Gregory the Great. From the earliest times, the popes
had that at least indirect temporal power which the
possession and free use of wealth give to its owners in
every civilised land. Of the early wealth of the popes,
Eusebius has preserved evidence enough. The letter?
of St. Dionysius of Corinth to Pope Soter (175-182)
tells of the previous generosity of the Roman Church
being outdone by Soter, who “furnished great supplies
to all the saints”; and Eusebius adds that the liberality
of the Church of Rome was continued to his time (fourth
century). The wealth of the Roman Church, which
enabled its bishops to be so liberal, was largely increased
by Constantine? and others after Christianity had over-
thrown paganism in the Roman world. So that by
the time of Gregory the Great, the bishop of Rome
had landed property (known as the patrimonies of St.
Peter) in every province of the empire. And long before
his time, the wealth of the bishop of Rome had furnished
the pagan with subject matter for pleasant raillery or
bitter sneer, as the case might be3

1 Hist. Eccles., iv. 23. Cf. vil. 5, where Dionysius of Alexandria
(248-265) speaks of Pope Stephen supplying with necessaries at
different times @// the provinces of Syria and Arabia.

eMC fate: tn Vit. ©. Sllvesk,

3 For the one case we have the well-known jocose remark of the
Consul Preetextatus to Pope Damasus (‘ludens b. papze Damaso’) :
“Make me bishop of Rome and I will be a Christian to-morrow”
(St. Jerome, Ep. 38 (al. 61), ad Pammach.); for the other the equally
famous attack of the pagan Ammianus Marcellinus (fourth century) on
the popes of his time, whom he represents as enriched by the offerings

ST. ZACHARY 283

After the conversion of Constantine, the popes had not
only that influence in temporal matters that follows wealth
and station, they had the direct power in civil affairs that
was given to all Christian bishops by the laws of the
empire. Constantine bestowed on all bishops consider-
able judicial power. “He permitted,” says Sozomen,
a lawyer of Constantinople who wrote about the middle
of the fifth century, “all who had law-suits to decline
the jurisdiction of the civil magistrates and to appeal
to the judgment of the bishops; he even ordered that
the sentence of the ecclesiastical tribunal should be more
binding than that of secular judges, that they should
have the same authority as those given by the emperor
himself; finally, that the governors of provinces and their
officers should be obliged to enforce their execution.”
Though part of these powers was somewhat restricted
by some of the successors of Constantine, still, in what
may be called the final expression of Roman law, the
Code of Justinian, the powers given to bishops in civil
affairs are both numerous and important. A glance at the
first book of the Code will convince anyone that there
is no exaggeration in this statement. The bishops had not
only to watch over the interests of youths, women, slaves,
orphans, prisoners and poor,? and to aid the magistrates
to suppress gambling,’ but to take their share in seeing
to the defence and other interests* of the cities—such as

of Roman matrons, driving about magnificently dressed and keeping a
table that surpassed the emperor's.

1 7. E., i. 9, cited by Gosselin, Zhe Power of the Pope, i. 153.

2 Cod. Justin., 1. i. tit. iv. n. 1, 12, 14, 22-24, 30, 33.

3 Jb. n. 25.

47, n. 8, 26, and Novel. 128, c. xv. Many of these enact-
ments are cited at length by Gosselin, § 103f. Cf the Prag-
matic Sanction issued by Justinian in August 554 for the government
of Italy. In the 19th section of this document, the emperor
decrees that commercial transactions be regulated by “those weights

‘284 ST. ZACHARY

the safe custody of the standard weights and measures
—and, with the chief men in the different provinces, to
select suitable persons for the purposes of local govern-
ment. It is only to be expected, then, that if bishops
in general had such powers, those of the great patriarchs
of both East and West would be more extensive. To
confine ourselves to the Western patriarchs, z¢, to the
Roman pontiffs, we have evidence of their great authority
in temporals in the words! of Socrates, a lawyer of
Constantinople, like Sozomen in the fifth century, who,
if not a Novatian himself, was certainly a great admirer
of that heresy and its votaries. Because the popes had
taken measures to suppress the Novatians, Socrates seizes
the occasion to rail at them for “going beyond the limits
of their ecclesiastical jurisdiction,’ and for what he is
pleased to call “degenerating into their present state
of secular domination.”

This ‘secular domination,’ which roused the wrath of
Socrates, because he found it adverse to his pet sect,
went on increasing, and was very largely exercised, as we
have seen, by St. Gregory the Great; so much so that
Dr. Hodgkin? notes that “the distance from the seat
of empire, the interruption of communication with

and measures which our piety hath by these presents entrusted
to the keeping of the most blessed Pope and the most ample
Senate.” Cf. § 12 for their rights in the election of the judzces.
Cf. Hodgkin, Ztaly, vi. 519 f.; Diehl, /zst7nzen (Paris 1901), p. 202.

1 HH. E., vii. 11. “Cum episcopatus Romanus... . ultra sacerdotii
fines progressus jam olim in dominationem (ém duvacrefav) degenerasset.”

2 Ttaly, etc., v. 355. The Doctor might well have added the “in-
difference or incapability of the central government.” As early as the
days of Justin II., during the pontificate of Benedict I. (568), the
Romans had been told by the emperor to see to their own safety (cf.
Menander, Excerpta, p. 327, ed. Bonn), and the exarch had told
Pelagius II. (577) that he could not protect the exarchate, much less
Rome. Cf. Pelagius’ letter to his apocrisiarius Gregory. Mansi, ix.
1889 (note in Jungmann, Déss., xiv. p. 107).

ST. ZACHARY 285

Ravenna, the lordship of the vast patrimony of St.
Peter, were all tending to turn the Pope, with his will
or against his will, into a temporal sovereign.” As time
went on one act of jurisdiction after another was performed
by Honorius, by Sisinnius, by Zachary ; and, on the other
hand, one act of rebellion after another against the
emperors on the part of the Romans themselves under
Constantine, and under Gregory II., forced the hands of the
popes ever more and more. So that before the end of
the first half of the eighth century the popes were
independent rulers of the duchy of Rome. The stamping
of his own name on the coins of the duchy by Zachary
was but a legitimate consequence of the people of Rome
refusing in the time of Pope Constantine to receive coins
stamped with the name of the emperor Philippicus. This
full independent civil power which accrued to the popes
in the eighth century was a natural result of temporal
authority wielded well and wisely for several centuries
previously. It is but a physical law that everything
that is well used grows. And notoriously, of all things,
power increases as it moves forward. And, on the other
hand, it is equally in accordance with nature that what
is ill used should cease to grow, nay, should shrink.
Nature and not ambition, then, is the key to the temporal
power of the popes.

Men who are not Christians will, it may be presumed,
accept the temporal power of the popes on what must
be to them the sufficient ground that it was well
gotten. But there are among those who profess that
name, men who hold that, as Our Lord declared that
“His kingdom was not of this world,” it is not right for
those who claim to be His vicars to hold the power
of kings. Apart from the truth that Our Lord’s kingdom,
if not ‘of, ze. ‘sprung from’ this world, is certainly ‘in’

286 ST. ZACHARY

this world, we have it on the word of Our Lord that
the children of the bridegroom were to do in His absence
what they were not to do in His presence. And so, though
the ‘temporal power’ cannot be said to be necessary in
itself, for it was not much in evidence during the centuries
of persecution, and is at present in abeyance, still ‘ temporal
power’ may be said to have become necessary with the
rise of the Christian nations. It would not have been so,
of course, with ideal Christian peoples. With human
nature such as it is and always was, however, temporal
power both was and is necessary to the popes if they
are to be the common Fathers of all nations alike. A
glance at the treatment meted out to them by the
Byzantine emperors or other tyrants will show the
absolute need the popes have of an independent temporal
power to enable them fearlessly to proclaim the faith of
Christ, as various non-Catholic writers! have admitted.
Passing over the persecutions of Liberius, St. John I,
Silverius, and Vigilius, as their names do not occur in
this part of the history of the Papacy on which we are
now engaged, we have seen St. Martin I. dragged off
to exile and death, and Sergius, John’ VI., and Gregory II.
only escaping a similar fate by the devotion of the people.
And it may be added that the history of the popes of
the tenth century, of those of Avignon and of Pius VII.
in the hands of Napoleon, clearly points to the same
moral. The Pope must be an independent ruler over
some State that he may be truly free to administer
the affairs of the Church in the best way. It is, then,
obviously the duty of everyone who has at heart the

1 Cf. Leibnitz, Hurter, etc., cited by the author of the Zemforal
Power of the Pope,i. 298. On this subject of the ‘Temporal Power’
of the popes, besides the able work just quoted, read De Maistre’s
clear and convincing book on Zhe Pofe (Eng. trans. by Dawson,
Lond.).

ST. ZACHARY 287

true interests of the Church to do all that lies in his
power that the ruffianly brigandage perpetrated in 1870,
when in the name of ‘Italian patriotism’ Rome and the
adjoining territory were wrested from their rightful owners
the popes, may be undone. Italy lawfully belonging
to Rome is the evidence of ancient history, but never
has history shown us Rome lawfully belonging to the
Italians. Medizval and modern Rome have been made
and preserved by the genius of the popes with the aid
of the wealth of the Christian world. Rome, then, belongs
to the popes; after them to the Christian world, particu-
larly, perhaps, to the countries of Western Europe.
Certainly not to the Italians alone, unless, forsooth, right
and justice are to be gauged by geographical position.
The sooner, then, Rome is restored to its proper owners
the sooner will another great wrong be set right.

To sum up what we have said. The foundation of the Summary
temporal power of the popes was their paramount spiritual aor
authority. For there can be no doubt that, at least in Estee
the very earliest records that we have, in which the relative
position of the ‘great rulers in the Church is touched upon,
the bishop of Rome is always set forth as the Head
of the Church Catholic—whatever may have been the
difference of opinion as to how far that headship
extended. This, their spiritual position, naturally brought
them wealth and station even during the era of the
persecutions. With the triumph of the Church under
Constantine, they shared in a pre-eminent degree the
powers he gave to all bishops. With the transference
of the seat of empire from Rome to Constantinople,
with the coming of the barbarians, the hold of the
emperors on Italy and the West kept lessening, whereas
the influence of the popes in Rome kept increasing—the
more that they were frequently its saviours. And with

288 ST. ZACHARY

the decay of the municipal system in the fourth century,
the most important position in the great cities of the
West was in the fifth century occupied by the bishops.
Mr. Dill, while telling us! that “the municipal system,
once the great glory of Roman organising power, had in
the fourth century fallen almost to ruin,” assures us that
“the real leader of the municipal community in the
fifth century, alike in temporal and in spiritual things,
was often the great Churchman.” ?

In Rome and in Italy in the sixth century, even
under the Ostrogoth, Arian though he generally was,
considerable power was left in the hands of the
Catholic bishops and the _ popes.? And when in
the same century the Ostrogoth was crushed out
of existence, and the ‘Roman’ empire once more
asserted itself in Italy, the Pragmatic Sanction of
Justinian did but put the popes on a higher pedestal
of temporal power than ever. In 568 came the Lombards
into Italy. From that the cause of the Roman empire
in Italy was lost. Sauve qui peut was the only possibility.
Preserving Rome from the ferocious Lombard, all power
in it was forced into the hands of the popes. They had
to take charge of its water and corn supply, to raise
and pay troops, to repair its walls. And when, in return
for saving Rome to the Empire, their persons were mal-
treated, and their faith outraged, the Roman people would
endure the cupidity and weak tyranny of their emperors
no longer. They threw off the yoke of the Greek, which
oppressed them, and chose that of the Popes which was easy.

1 Roman Society in the Last Century of the Western Empire, p. 204.

2 7b., 180.

8 Cf. Hutton, Zhe Church of the Sixth Century, pp. 30f. and 96, a
book in which, by the way, it is seemingly at least insinuated that the
patriarch of Constantinople was the recognised head of the Church in
the sixth century.

Seed EN oe
Ai Di 7522

AND

5 LEP Hen LD. TLL
A.D. 752-757.

——0-—

Sources.—The life in the Z. P. is full of minute details of Stephen
ITI.’s dealings with the Lombards, and was perhaps written by
one who went with that Pope into France. Indeed, the by no
means unsparing use throughout the ‘life’ of such emphatic
epithets as ‘most wicked,’ ‘diabolical,’ etc., applied to the
Lombard king and his doings, seems enough of itself to show
a Roman author who had felt the effects of his unscrupulous
attacks on the devoted duchy. It is interesting, however, to note
that there exists a MS. edition of the Liber Pontificalis containing
this Pope’s life, where these little-flattering epithets of the Lom-
bard king are omitted, as also the pleasing ones applied to the
Franks. Apparently in this MS. we have an edition prepared
for Lombard use, and so, of course, drawn up before the fall of
their kingdom in 774 (Duchesne, Z. &., i, ccxxv). The last-
named author reckons three editions of the biography of Stephen
III.; and concludes that the interpolations in the original con-
temporary lives of the popes of the eighth century were introduced
into them before the end of the same century. Gregorovius
(Rome, ii. p. 273 note) has now at length no difficulty in
admitting that “the Lzber Pontificais from this time onwards
is fairly accurate and trustworthy. ”

Some eight letters in the Codex Carolinus and extracts from

VOLal Bt. ik 19

Stephen
IIL., 752
(March).

His death,

290 STEPHEN Il. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL

various Chronicles complete the authorities for the lives of
Stephen II. and III.

Works.—Mtr. Freeman, in The Patriciate of Pippin in Vol. IV.,
1889, of the Lnglish Historical Review, holds that “when Pope
Stephen III. bestowed the title of patrician of the Romans
on Pippin, he did it by the authority of the reigning emperor
Constantine Kopronymos.” The evidence he adduces, however,
seems scarcely adequate.

EMPEROR OF THE KINGS OF THE EXARCH OF
EAST. LOMBARDS. RAVENNA.
Constantine V. Aistulf, 749-756. Eutychius, 727-752

(Copronymus), 741-775. Desiderius, 756-774. (apparently the last
of the exarchs).

IMMEDIATELY after the death of Pope Zachary, ‘the
whole people’ (cunctus populus) elected a certain priest
Stephen as his successor. But after being formally
inducted into the Lateran Palace, he was, on the morning
of the third day after his election, stricken with apoplexy
whilst in his chair transacting some of his domestic affairs.
Death? ensued on the following day. One consequence
of the premature death of this Stephen before his consecra-
tion as bishop has been to cause great disorder in the
numbers assigned to the different Stephens that have
followed him. Thus a great many historians call the
immediate successor of this unconsecrated Stephen,
Stephen II, but as many more Stephen III. For
ourselves we shall call the second Stephen, who succeeded
Zachary, Stephen III., for two reasons. First, because we
hold that election on the one hand and consent on the
other are enough to make a Pope. From the time, at least,
of St. Benedict II.,2 the popes elect have exercised full

1Z. P. in vit. Steph. III., and many of the annals, e.g, Annal.

Nazar. (ap. M. G. H.,1., ad an. 751), “Stephanus electus, tertia die
percussus,” 4 Cfictp., poss.

STEPHEN IJ. AND STEPHEN (II.) It. 291

Jurisdiction in the Church, and hence were acting as Heads
of the Church,as popes. And secondly, in the official list
of the popes published yearly in Rome in the ‘ Diario’
(Almanac), the number II. is affixed to the Stephen whose
name is omitted by many in their lists of the popes; and as
still further showing the tradition of the Roman Church,
the portrait of the Stephen who reigned but for three days
appears among the mosaic medallions of the Popes which
adorn the basilica of St. Paul outstde-the-walls.

In this same month of March, ‘ the whole people of God’
assembled in the venerable basilica of St. Mary Major, and
there, after pouring forth ardent prayers to God and Our
Lady, unanimously elected another Stephen, a deacon.
Amidst the greatest rejoicings, the newly-elected Pope was
conveyed, first to the Lateran basilica, and then, ‘ according
to custom,’ to the adjoining palace. He was consecrated
on March 26;* for we are told in the Zzfe of Zachary, in the
Liber Ponttficalts, that the bishopric of Rome was vacant
twelve days; and, as Stephen II. was never a bishop, we
arrive at this date for the consecration of Stephen III.

From a very early age Stephen was brought up in the
Lateran Palace. On the death of his father, he was
entrusted to the care of the popes, and thoroughly imbued
with the doctrine and spirit of the apostles by the great
pontiffs Gregory III, and Zachary. Hence, in his pontifi-
cate he showed himself a lover of God’s Church, a firm
upholder of ecclesiastical tradition, a ready supporter of the
poor of Christ, a constant preacher of God’s word, and a
bold defender of his flock. His love for the poor Stephen

Boal Ex * Or April 3. Ch supra, p. 276.

2 Jb, Two deacons, Stephen and Paul, assisted at the council of 744.

They were doubtless Stephen (II.) III. and his brother Paul I. They

were ordained deacons by Zachary (cf. in vit. Zac.).
3 I, P. Gregorovius only does him justice when he calls him an

‘able man’ (Rome, ii. p. 272). Kellet (Pope Gregory, p. 94), more

Early life.

292 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IL

showed in a most practical manner. Four hospitals
(xenodochia) within the city walls, which by the ravages
of time had fallen into decay, he completely restored,
enriched with presents and protected by a bull of inter-
dict! Another he re-established for daily supplying food
to a hundred poor; and outside the city walls, on the
Vatican hill, near St. Peter’s, he built two new hospitals,
and attached them to the already existing deaconries
(diaconie) of Our Lady and St. Sylvester. That glorious
title, ‘lover of the poor, the special appanage of the good
Christian, was not given to Stephen in vain.

a ae Under Pope Stephen there began in real earnest the

Lombards. last desperate attempt on the part of the Lombards to
bring all Italy, the duchy of Rome included, under their
barbaric sway. A contest which, after some twenty-two
years duration, was to end in the destruction of the
Lombard kingdom, and leave the popes in peaceful rule
over central Italy, was now begun between the popes,
naturally and justly anxious to preserve the independence
of the Roman duchy, and the Lombard kings bent on
aggrandisement. Aistulf? whom even Muratori, with his
Lombard leanings, allows to have been a man of little
conscience, and less judgment, attacked the territories
still under the exarch with great vigour. His victorious
troops overran Istria and the Pentapolis. Either in this
year (752), or in the preceding, Ravenna fell into his hands,
anxious for some petty antithesis than for truth, tells us that Stephen
“was a man of very inferior mind to Zacharias, but by his weakness
the union between Frankish king and Roman bishop, which the
strength of his predecessor had so effectively promoted, was still
further cemented.”

12. P. “Quee (xenodochia) et per privilegii paginam sub anathe-
matis interdicto confirmavit.”
2 Annal.,ad an. 755. “Astolfo .... uomo di poca coscienza, ed

anche di men giudizio.”
* A diploma found in the monastery of Farfa, and treated of by

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL. 293

and thus, after some 180 years’ duration, the power of the
exarchs was broken for ever! Stephen heard with alarm
that preparations were being made by Aistulf for the
conquest of the Roman duchy. Whilst “his enemy was
still afar off,” the Pope, “in the third month after his con-
secration” (June 752), sent with presents to the king his
brother the deacon Paul (afterwards Pope), and Ambrose,
the primicerius of the notaries, to arrange for a peace.
Soothed with gold, the Lombard agreed to a peace of
forty years But in four months all thoughts of peace
had left the breast of the ambitious Lombard. He made
no secret of his intention of subjecting to his rule Rome and
its dependencies ; and, to bring matters to a head, calmly
demanded an annual tribute of a golden solidus (12s. 6d.)
from every inhabitant of Rome. Again Stephen made
another effort to preserve the peace. And in the autumn
the abbots of the two great monasteries of St. Vincent’s, on
the Vulturnus, and Monte Cassino were sent to the Lombard
king. To their words Aistulf paid not the slightest heed
but sent them off to their monasteries, forbidding them to
return to the Pope.”

Whilst, on the news of this rebuff, the Pope, according
to his wont, was engaged in recommending his cause “and
that of the people committed to him” to God, there arrived
in Rome from Constantinople, John, the Silentiary, with,
not an army, but imperial rescripts for the Pope and

Muratori (Antig. Ital. Diss., \xvii.), was dated by Aistulf: “Ravennze
in Palatio, IV die mensis Julii, felicissimi regni nostri III per Indic. IV,”
Ze., 751. (Cf Murat., Annal., ad an. 752, vol. vii. p. 18).

1“Tertio apostolatus ordinationis suz mense disponens....
Paulum atque Ambrosium .... plurimis cum muneribus ad....
Aistulfum ad pacis ordinandum . .. . foedera misit,” etc. LZ. P.

2 Almost verbatim from the Z. P. Cf. Chron. Vultur., iii., ap.
R. I. S., i. The abbey of St. Vincent, near the source of the river
Vulturnus, is about twelve miles from Monte Cassino. Cf. Paul. Diac.,,
vi. 40, and the notes thereto in Migne’s ed.

204 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IIL.) II.

Aistulf, demanding from the latter the restoration of the
exarchate. Stephen at once despatched John, along with
the deacon Paul, “to the said most wicked king”? at
Ravenna. But John was sent off by the cunning Aistulf,
with words and a companion, in the shape of an envoy
from himself to the emperor. The Pope took good care
to send ambassadors of his own also to Constantinople
along with John; and through them he begged the
emperor to send an army for the defence of Rome, and the
liberation of the rest of Italy, from “the jaws of the son
of iniquity,” as he had “so often asked him to do in
writing.” 2

In describing the sequel of events at this epoch, we
cannot do better than continue to keep as close as possible
to the very words of the Book of the Popes. Meanwhile
Aistulf continued his preparations, and his threats. He
would put every Roman to the sword if they did not
submit to his rule. But Stephen called the people
together, and exhorted them to implore God’s pardon for
their sins, assuring them that He would yet free them from
the hands of their foes. Accordingly a great procession
was formed to go to the Church of St. Mary Major.
Litanies were chanted and images of Our Lady and Our
Lord carried by the priests. The Pope himself, walking
with bare feet, bore on his shoulders a famous picture of
Our Lord,’ thought to have been miraculously painted ;

1 Still Z. P. The papal biographer never fails to prefix some
strong epithet to the name of the Lombard king. And considering
the aims of Aistulf, this need cause little surprise. Men are not wont
to be tender when speaking of the would-be destroyers of their
freedom.

2 “Juxta quod ei szepius scripserat.” LZ. P. How clearly does this
conduct of the Pope’s show that it was not ‘ambition’ but ‘the
necessity of the case’ that made temporal sovereigns of the popes of

this period.
3 Still preserved in the ‘Sancta Sanctorum’ oratory of the Lateran.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II) III. 295

while, fastened to the ‘adorable cross, was also borne along
the ‘treaty’ which Aistulf had violated. With ashes on
their heads, most fervently did the people beg help from
God. The Pope improved the occasion by doing all he
could to advance both clergy and people in virtue. The
former he collected in his palace at the Lateran, and exhorted
to devote themselves to the study of the Scriptures! and
sacred learning with the greatest earnestness ; and he was
indefatigable in preaching to the people to keep from evil
and lead holy lives. And for the safety of the country and
of all Christians, he ordered the litany to be said every
Saturday alternately at St. Mary Major’s, St. Peter’s and
St. Paul’s. Well may we ask with Mark Antony ?: “Was
this ambition?” ....“ Ambition should be made of
sterner stuff.” But Stephen knew that if “we ought to
pray as though our affairs were wholly God’s, we ought
to act as though they solely rested with ourselves.” And
so, realising that his efforts for peace, and his treasures,
which he had freely scattered “for the flock divinely en-
trusted to his care and for all the province of Italy,” were
all thrown away, and “especially because he saw that
there was no hope of help from the emperor, then, as his
predecessors of blessed memory, the two Gregorys and
Zachary, had done to Charles (Martel), he (Stephen) sent
secretly, by a pilgrim, letters to Pippin, king of the
Franks, unfolding to him the wretched state in which
the Roman duchy was, owing to the hostile action of
Aistulf, and imploring him to send ambassadors to Rome,
who might ensure him (the Pope) safe conduct to their

1 “Clerum ....admonebat divinam totis nisibus scrutari Scrip-
turam.” Z. P. It is scarcely worth while to point out that this
advice ‘to search the Scriptures’ was given by a Pope to his
clergy some 800 years before the ‘discovery’ of the Bible by Martin

Luther.
® Julius Cesar, Act III, Sc, ii,

2096 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL.

master.”! It is not often that any of the papal biographers
in the Lzber Pontificalis assign any motives for any action
whatsoever which they relate. In this instance, however, it
is most positively affirmed that the reasons why Stephen
III. had recourse to Pippin were that diplomacy had failed
to avert the invasion of the duchy, and that no help could
be looked for from the East.2 Historians, then, of to-day,
who set forth other motives for Stephen’s action than the
two just given, may be set down as rather following
conjecture, if not prejudice, than the records of history.
And writers who blame the popes for appealing to the king
of the Franks must be strangely forgetful that the yoke
of foreigners is ever hateful; and foreigners to the Romans
of the eighth century were certainly the Lombards, aliens
to them in blood, language and customs. And surely
they cannot call in question the right of one who is
unjustly attacked in his goods, person, or liberty, to call
anybody to his assistance.

In answer to Stephen’s letter, there came first Abbot
Droctegang (Spring 753), and then another messenger
from Pippin, to assure the Pope that their master would
do all that the Pope wished. By the hands of the abbot
the Pope sent off two letters, one® of thanks to Pippin,
telling him he had given Droctegang a verbal answer to
his (Pippin’s) communication, and begging him not to fail
in the work he had begun. The other* was addressed

1 “Dum ab eo (Aistulfo) nihil hac de re (sc. pace) obtineret, cernens
presertim et ab Imperiali potentia nullum esse subveniendi auxilium,

tunc quemadmodum preedecessores ejus. ... Carolo... . direxerunt,
: . ipse .... clam per peregrinum suas litteras misit Pipino.”
Lak,

? Hence Gregorovius (Rome, ii. p. 275) asserts that Stephen ‘was
driven by necessity’ to summon Pippin to his aid. On the very next
page, cheerfully sacrificing consistency to an antithesis, he speaks of
the Pope “as a rebel towards his lawful emperor, ”

3 Cod, Carol, ep. 4. * hs 5.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) III. 297

“to all our glorious sons and dukes of the Franks.”
There was the more reason for this that some of the
Frankish leaders were opposed to war. Eginhard+ assures
us that Pippin was much hampered, “because some of the
chief men of the Franks, his councillors, had been much
opposed to his wishes, and had gone so far as to declare
that they would desert the king and return home.” “We
have full confidence,” writes the Pope to them, “that you
fear God and love your protector Blessed Peter, the Prince
of the Apostles; and that for his interests you will, at our
request, with all earnestness, come to our aid. And you
may take it as certain that in return for your efforts in
behalf of your spiritual mother, his holy Church, your sins
will be forgiven you by the Prince of the Apostles, and
that for your toil you will receive a hundredfold from
God.” In conclusion he begs them to support the petition
he is addressing by Droctegang to their king.

Meanwhile the Lombards were pushing on, and had just
taken possession of a place” occupied by the serfs of the
Church, when there returned from Constantinople the
Silentiary John, and those who had gone with him from
the Pope and Aistulf. John brought nothing but another
rescript, bidding the Pope go in person to the Lombard
king and try and win from him the restoration of the lost
provinces. A safe conduct for the Pope and his suite was
obtained from Aistulf; and Stephen was on the point of
setting out for the North when some new ambassadors
arrived in Rome from Pippin. These were Chrodegang3
Bishop of Metz, one of the most distinguished ecclesiastics

1 In vit. Carol., c. 4.

2 Called *Ciccanense Castellum’ (Ceccano, a little south of Frosinone
on the Via Latina). ZL. P.

8 Cf, his life in Butlers Zzves of the Saints, March 6. On the

selection of Chrodegang for this work, see Paul the Deacon, Gesta ep,
Metens., Nigne, t. 95, p. 709.

Advance
of the
Lombards.

298 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL

of this age, and Duke Autchar, who had come to escort
the Pope into France (¢e, Frank-land), in accordance
with his wishes. With these various ambassadors, and a
number of the Roman clergy, nobility, and military leaders,
the Pope, though out of health, left Rome (October 14,
753), amidst the greatest signs of grief on the part of the
people not only of Rome itself, but of the other cities of
the duchy.1. When Stephen drew near to Pavia, he was
met by envoys from Aistulf, who bade the Pope on no
account to dare to speak to their master in behalf of
Ravenna, or of any other conquest made by him or any of
his predecessors.2 Sending word that no threats would
make him keep silence on this matter, Stephen entered
Pavia ; and at once, after presenting the king with numerous
presents, begged him to restore ‘their own to each party,’
But neither could the Pope nor the Imperial ambassador
obtain anything from Aistulf. It required the strongest
representations? on the part of Pippin’s envoys before
Aistulf would give the Pope permission to continue his
journey towards France. He fretted and fumed, and
used every means to prevent the Pope from fulfilling his
intention of going to France. He evidently instinctively
feared what would be the result to his ambitious schemes.
His opposition was vain. As soon as his verbal consent
was passed, Stephen, with his clergy, among whom are
names that are not here mentioned for the first and last
time (such as the priest Stephen, afterwards Stephen IV. ;

1 Direct from the Z, P. Gregorovius, on no authority but his own
(ii. 276-7), attributes a large share of these acts of the Pope to the
previous agreement of the ‘ Roman people.’

? “Obtestans eum (Stephanum) nulla penitus ratione audere verbum
illi dicere petendi Ravennatium civitatem, et Exarchatum ei pertinentem,
vel de reliquis reipublicee locis, quze ipse vel ejus preedecessores Longo-
bardorum reges invaserant.” LZ. P,

3 “Francorum missi imminebant foré¢er apud Aistulfum.”
“ Unde, ut leo, dentibus fremebat.” ZL. ?,

ee

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) Ill. 299

the archdeacon Theophylact, a candidate for the papacy;
the deacon Gemmulus, a correspondent of St. Boniface,
etc.), set out (November 15, 753) with the greatest haste.
But only did he feel at ease when they had reached those
passes of the Alps that were in the hands of the Franks.
Stephen made his first considerable halt at the monastery
of St. Maurice at Agaune in Valais, on the Rhone, above
Lake Geneva. Here, to escort Stephen to their king,
came the Abbot Fulrad and Duke Rothard. And here
the poor Pope had need of rest. In the weak state of
his health, he tells us? himself how the long and arduous
journey affected him. The distance, the snow and the cold,
the heat, the floods and the rushing rivers, ‘the atrocious
mountains, caused his weak frame absolutely to wear away
—pre phatigio validi tteneris caro nostra minuata est.
When Pippin heard of Stephen’s approach, he sent Meeting of

Pippin and

forward his son Charles to meet the Pope; and himself, te Pane
- onthion,
his wife, and a large number of his nobles advanced some Jan. 6, 754

three miles from the royal residence of Ponthion ? to wel-
come the Pontiff. As soon as Pippin saw the Pope, he
dismounted, prostrated himself to the ground, and for some
distance walked by the Pope’s side as his groom.? Arrived

1 Cod. C. 7 G. On St. Maurice, of which “little but the tower
remains of the once ancient building,” see /7 the Valley of the Rhone,
by C. W. Wood (London, 1899).

2 In Perthois, in the province of Lower Champagne.

3 “TDescendens de equo suo... . terre prostratus.... Cui et
vice stratoris usque in aliquantum locum juxta ejus sellarem properavit.”
L.P. Cf. Contin. Fredegar., c. 118, who speaks of presents given by the
Pope to the Franks and their king, and of the Pope imploring their
aid against the Lombards. “Ut ab eorum oppressionibus....
liberaretur et tributa et munera que ....a Romanis requirebant
facere, desisterent.” Cf Chron. Moissiac., ap. M. G. SS., 1. 292-3,
and the circumstantial account of the whole journey of the Pope at the
close of the first part of the Gesta Efp. Neap.,c. 40. The first part
was drawn up by an unknown writer about the beginning of the ninth
century. (C/. the ed, in the 44. G. SS. Langob.)

Pippin
anointed
king.

The Kier-
sey Com-
pact,
April 754.

300 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL

at the palace (January 6, 754), Stephen, with tears in his
eyes, implored Pippin to take up the cause of “Blessed
Peter and the republic of the Romans.” Pippin at once
engaged himself! on oath, after making a solemn treaty
with him—ger pacis federa—to fulfil the Pope’s wishes
with regard to the exarchate and the republic to the
very best of his abilities.

After the interview at Ponthion, the Pope went to the
famous monastery of St. Denis to pass the winter; and
here he soon afterwards anointed Pippin and his two
sons as kings of the Franks (754),2 and declared them
‘patricians of the Romans.’ Furthermore, we have it on the
authority of the author of the Clausula, already referred to,
that he forbade, under pain of excommunication, any to
presume for the future to elect as their king one who was
not of the blood of Pippin. Thus did a Pope in person
confirm what had been already done by the direction of
his predecessor. A little later, according to the annals? in

17. P. “Qui de presenti jurejurando eundem bb. Papam satisfecit
omnibus ejus mandatis et ammonitionibus sese totis nisibus obedire et
ut illi placitum fuerit exarchatum Ravenne et reipublicee jura seu loca
reddere modis omnibus.”

2 “Steph. P., postquam a Rege Pippino ecclesia Romane de-
fensionis firmitatem accepit, ipsum sacra unctione ad regi dignitatis
honorem consecravit,” etc. Einhard, Avz., ad an. 754. With his
statement compare that of Aum. Lauriss. M. G. SS., pp. 138-9 ;
Annal, Moissiac., 1b.,293, which add that Pippin and his two sons were
anointed kings and patricians, of the Romans; Z. P., n. 26; and
particularly a note which a monk of St. Denis added to the end of a
MS. of Gregory of Tours, in the year 767, as he tells us himself in the
said note, and which has been published, among other places, in the
M. G. SS. Merov.,i. In addition to corroborating the foregoing, the
monk adds that the Pope forbade the Franks to elect a king outside
the family of Pippin, who had been exalted by the providence of God,
and who had been consecrated by the vicar of the apostles.

* The date is furnished by the Annals of Metz (ad an. 754,
apparently citing a passage which has disappeared from the Chron.
Moitssiac.), and the continuator of Fredegard, c. 120. But these two
authorities give a different place (Braisne) for the meeting of the

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) II. 301

March, at the earnest prayer of the Pope, Pippin caused
to be confirmed at a general assembly of the nobility at
Kiersey (or Quiercy), on the Oise, what he had already
undertaken to do for Blessed Peter and his successors
We shall hear of the ‘Kiersey treaty’ again.

At present we refrain from any comment on these
interesting and important transactions, that the simple
narrative of the events themselves may make their due
impression on the mind of the reader. It shall merely be
added that subsequent testimony of various kinds, which
will be noticed in the sequel, make it certain that a deed
of gift (donatio) of the exarchate, etc., was at this great
assembly presented to the Pope by Pippin.

One or two events occurred just at this juncture, and
prevented the immediate putting of this resolution into
effect. In the first place the Pope fell ill, but at length
suddenly recovered.2_ So rapid, however, was the recovery,
that it was soon given out that it was not without the

nobles. The papal biographer, who is here an authority of the first
order—as he was probably one of those who accompanied the Pope
into France—gives (cf. infra, n. 1) Kiersey as the place of meeting.
However, as the two places are not far distant one from the other, it
may have been that some preliminary meeting was held at Braisne.

1 Pippinus “congregans cunctos proceres .... statuit cum eis,
que semel Christo favente, una cum.... bb. Papa decreverat,
perficere.” LZ. P. Cf 2b. im vit. Had, i., where Hadrian asks
Charlemagne to fulfil the undertaking given by Pippin and the French
nobles at Kiersey to Stephen III. when he went to France: “ Quando
in Franciam perrexit, pro concedendis diversis civitatibus, ac territoriis
istius Italie provinciee, et contrahendis b. Petro, ejusque omnibus
Vicariis in perpetuum possidendis.” (Cf zz/ra, pp. 312, 410.)

2 “Dum eum mane mortuum invenire sperabant, sudzto alio die
sanus repertus est” (Z. P., n. 28). It was doubtless upon this
statement that was founded the supposititious document known as
The Revelation made to Pope Stephen (ap. Migne, t. 89). Belief in the
Pope’s miraculous recovery was already current in the time of Louis
the Pious. (See a letter of his prefixed to the Areofagitica of the
abbot Hilduin, who lived in the first half of the next century, ap,
W. G. Epp., v- 325.) :

Illness ot
the Pope,

_ 302 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) III.

Carlomann
leaves his
monastery
and returns
to France.

The
Franks
march
against the
Lombards,
754+

miraculous intervention of SS. Peter and Paul, and St.
Dionysius (or Denis), as the Pope himself was made to
proclaim in a document on the subject, which gratitude
was said to have impelled him to put forth. It is interest-
ing to note, in this curious forgery, that the title of ‘most
Christian, which the Book of the Popes has now begun to
prefix to the name of King Pippin, is here also assigned
to the same sovereign.

The next event was the arrival in France of the monk
Carlomann. Aistulf, finding that Pippin was evidently
determined to go to extremities with him, tried to put
pressure on him to make him hang back, in a rather unex-
pected manner. The wily Lombard gave the abbot of Monte
Cassino to understand that it would go hard with him and
his monastery if Carlomann was not at once sent to his
brother to induce him to stay in France. Thither, then,
went the unwilling monk ;! but he was doubtless not much
distressed when he found that Pippin was not to be turned
aside from his purpose. To avoid complications, the Pope
and Pippin decided that Carlomann must retire to the
monastery of Vienne. Thither the humble monk accord-
ingly went, and there he died in peace in the following

year (August 17, 755).
After no less than three embassies,? which the wish

1 That he really went against /his will is clear from the words of
Eginhard (Ammad., ad an. 753): “ Nec ille abbatis sui jussa contemnere,
nec Abbas illius praeceptis Regis Longobardorum, qui ei hoc imperavit,
audebat resistere.” Cf Annal. Lauris. (ap. M. G. SS.,i. 138). The
words of these authors serve to modify the account in the Z, P.
According to the Chron. S. Bened. (M. G. SS. Lang., 487), the Pope
had a hand in the journey of Carlomann. “In Francia legatus pro rei
publice a papa missus, ibi vitam finivit.”

2 In addition to the Z. P., see on these embassies Contin. Fred,, c.
119. Of the embassy by which Pippin offered money, the Azmals of
Motssiac. (M. G. S'S., i. 293) relate that when Aistulf asked what was
required of him, the envoys answered: “Ut ei (S. Petro) reddas

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL 303

of the Pope for peace had caused Pippin to send to
Aistulf, had failed, even with offers of money, to induce
the Lombard king to surrender what he had seized,
Pippin at length set his forces in motion. Even at this
eleventh hour, nothing would content the peace-loving
Pope but that Pippin should send yet another embassy
to Aistulf; and Stephen himself wrote to him, begging him
by the thought of the day of judgment to restore, with-
out causing a loss of Christian life, their rights to the
Church and the Republic of the Romans. For sole
answer came insolent threats. But Aistulfs | arm was
not so powerful as his tongue. The Frankish forces
moved forward. Commending himself to his prayers,
Pippin parted from the Pope at Maurienna, in sight
of Italy’s mountain rampart. The passes of the Alps
were triumphantly forced by the Franks, and the month
of September or October saw Aistulf besieged in his
own capital of Pavia. A few days’ fighting and Aistulfs
resistance was at an end. Once again, at the suggestion
of the Pope, terms of peace were proposed, and this
time they were accepted by Aistulf. The Lombard gave
hostages to Pippin, and swore ‘to restore’ Ravenna and
the other cities that he had captured.?

No sooner had Pippin returned to France, and the The Lom-
Pope to Rome, when the false Lombard was in arms oe .
again. To ensure victory he aroused the whole nation;.* °*"*
and, as appears from the Pope’s letters, contrived mean-

Pentapolim, Narnias, et Cecanum, et omnia unde populus Romanus de
tua iniquitate conqueritur ; et hoc tibi mandat Pippinus, quod si justitiam
S. Petro reddere vis, dabit tibi 12,000 solidorum.”

1 Direct from Z. P., n.-33.
2 “Spopondit .... sub terribili sacramento.... se redditurum

civitatem Ravennatium cum aliis diversis civitatibus.”” Z. P. Cf
Eginhard 2 wit. Carol.,c. 4; Predegar. contin.
3 “Generalem faciens commotionem cum universo regni sul... .

populo.” LZ, P.

304 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) III.

while to throw dust into the eyes of Pippin. But Stephen
was not slow to make known the situation to the Frankish
king. Two letters! were despatched to him, one after the
other (755°), pretty much to the same effect, but sent to
let Pippin see that affairs were becoming daily more critical.
They were both written at the close of the year 754 or
the beginning of 755. Both were addressed to the Pope’s
“ Most excellent sons, Pippin, Charles and Carlomann, kings
and patricians of the Romans.” The Frank is exhorted
not to let his reverence and devotion to St. Peter remain
inoperative, but to see that he withdraw not his hand
from the plough now that he has begun to help the
Church. “From the day on which we separated, Aistulf
has endeavoured to afflict us, and to reduce the Church
of God to such a depth of ignominy that the tongue of
man cannot describe it.2... Not an inch of land has
he returned to St. Peter, the church and the republic of
the Romans. ... Haste to restore to St. Peter what,
under your hand and seal, you promised for the good
of your soul. ... To you have we committed the care
of the cause of Holy Church, and you will have an
account to render to God at the last day of how you
have striven for that cause, of how you have laboured to
bring about the restoration of his (St. Peter’s) lands and
cities. .. . For you know? that the Prince of the Apostles

? Ap. Migne, P. L., t. 98, p. 103f., or MZ. G. Epp., iii., epp. 6 and 7.

2 The first of the two letters, viz., 6 of the Cod. Carol. “Nec unius
enim palmi terrze spatium b. Petro sancteeque D. E., vel R. RR”...
“Quod b. Petro polliciti estis, et per donationem vestram, manu

firmatam, pro mercede anime vestra, b. Petro reddere et contradere
festinate.”

* The second of the two letters, viz. Ep. 7, Cod. C. “ Sciatis enim quia
sicut chirographum, vestram donationem princeps app. firmiter tenet.”
The whole of our people of the Roman Republic — cunctus mostvre
populus rei puplice Romanorum—is as much distressed at the state
of affairs as the Pope himself. 0,

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) UL 305

holds your deed of gift as it were handwriting against
you.” This deed of gift (donatio), so frequently mentioned
in these two letters, refers, of course, to the gift by Pippin
at Kiersey to ‘Blessed Peter,’ z.¢, of course to his vicar
the Pope, of Ravenna and the Pentapolis, They were
Pippin’s to give by the right of conquest. Unable or
unwilling to defend them, the Greeks had left them to
fall into the hands of the Lombards, Taken from them
by the Frankish king, they were of his free will! given
to the Pope. These States are always said in the docu-
ments of the time to be ‘restored, because they were
snatched from the hands of plunderers and were ‘given
back,’ if not to the same men who ruled them before
(viz., the Greek emperors), at least to the same people
who lived in them before, and to a ruler of their own
nationality, a ruler of their own religion, and a ruler of
their own choice, whom they loved, and for whom they
had taken up arms. The ‘image-breaking’ emperors of
Constantinople were nothing to Pippin; but the popes
were his benefactors, and to him, as successors of St.
Peter, the earthly representatives of Our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ.

At length, laying waste everything with fire and Atstulf
sword,? and carrying off “many of the bodies of the ee
saints from the catacombs,” Aistulf encamped before ee
the walls of Rome in the beginning of January, and
began the siege with considerable vigour. The attack
was met with equal vigour by the besieged, who were

1“Propria vestra voluntate per donationis paginam b. Petro,
sancteeque Dei ecclesize et reipublicz civitates et loca restituenda
confirmastis.” Ep. 6.

2 “Omnia que erant extra urbem, ferro et igne devastans, atque
funditus demoliens.” Z. P. Cf. Hodgkin, /zaly, vol. vii., bk. 8, c. 8.
Unfortunately all this and the next vol. had been already written
before vols. 7 and 8 of Dr. Hodgkin’s work appeared in print.

VOU eer Ut 20

First letter
of the
Pope to
Pippin,
756, 6
Feb, 24.

306 STEPHEN Il. AND STEPHEN (II.) IL

animated by the valour of the abbot Werner, one of
Pippin’s envoys who accompanied the Pope on his
return to Rome, and by the Franks! who had formed
his escort. News of all this was not long in reaching
Pippin. But the siege pressed, and Pippin did not
appear, so that, about the close of February, the Pope
managed to get some letters sent off to Pippin by the
abbot Werner and others, who went by sea.

The first? of these letters was addressed to Pippin and
all the clergy, nobles and army of the Franks, by the
Pope, clergy, nobles, people and army of Rome, all in
affliction, It opens by describing the arrival of the
different divisions of the Lombard forces in the begin-
ning of January, the different portions of the walls that
they severally attacked, and Aistulf’s demand on his first
approach: “Give up to me your bishop, open the Salarian
gate, and I will be merciful to you; otherwise I will over-
throw your walls, and put you all to the edge of the
sword, and I would like to know who will then snatch
you out of my hands.” Then follows a narration of their
doings, which proves, up to the hilt, that the Lombards
were but little less barbarous than they were when
they first darkened the soil of Italy; that they were
indeed the worst of the hordes that devastated that un-
happy country on the break-up of the Roman empire
in the West, and that those not subject to their
sway might well resist them by every means in their
power. And this, too, even if we allow that the picture
drawn was as highly coloured as possible for the benefit
of Pippin.

1 The annals of Lorsch tell us of the “non minima Francorum
manus” that marched with Pippin’s envoys to Rome. Cf. Annual,
Fuld., etc., ap. M@. G. Z., i.

2 Migne, P. Z., t. 98, p. 111 f., or 7 G. EAp., 9.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) Itt. 307

Houses and churches they burnt to the ground, images
of the saints they broke in pieces or cast into the flames,
and the sacred gifts, ze, the body of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, they put into certain of their polluted vessels
which they called ‘folles’; and after they had sated
themselves with other food, they eat these same sacred
gifts ; the sacred vestments they applied to their private
uses; monks they put to the sword, and nuns they
violated and then treated in the same way. All the
‘domus culte’ of the Church they burnt,....the vines
and) crops’ they rooted up... .. All the serfs of the
Church and of all the Romans they killed or led captive.
They inflicted greater evils on the Roman province than
were ever done to it by pagan nations.” Next is set forth
the vigour of the attack, the various engines that day and
night were directed against the walls, and the taunts flung
at them by the Lombards, who cry out to them: “ Let
the Franks come now and pluck you from our grasp.”
The letter concludes with an earnest appeal for help, as
the Franks hope for help from God.

Another letter,2 conceived in similar terms, was ad-
dressed by the Pope in his own name to Pippin alone.
In it Stephen asks for help because to the king of
the Franks has he entrusted “God’s holy Church and
our people of the Roman republic to be protected.” Still
the troops of Pippin did not appear, and still the Lombard
assaults continued, and so the Pope, to use the absurdly
melodramatic language of certain authors “took the

1 “Munera sacra, z.2., corpus D. N. J. C., in suis contaminatis
vasibus, quas folles vocant, miserunt, et cibo carnium copioso saturati,
comedebant eadem munera.” Ep. 9 G. One need hardly pause to
call attention to the belief in the ‘real presence’ here expressed.

2 Ep. ix., ap. Migne, p. 115; Ep.8G. “Sanctam Dei ecclesiam, et
nostrum Rom. Reip. populum commisimus protegendum.”

Second
letter of
the Pope
to Pippin.

3 Milman, H7s¢. of. Lat. Christ. iii. p. 22f. Gregorovius, Rome, etc.,

308 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL

impious step of writing a letter, as from St. Peter himself”
—“ventured on the awful assumption of the person of the
apostle,” etc, etc. That the Pope should write in the
person of St. Peter is not in the least extraordinary, when
it is considered, on the one hand, that Pippin had always
before his mind that the Pope did occupy the place of St.
Peter, for he ever spoke of helping ‘St. Peter’ and giving
the exarchate to ‘St. Peter’; and on the other, that the
Pope himself believed, as most Christians have at all times
believed, that he was the successor of St. Peter; was, as
such, the Rock on which the Church of Christ was founded,
and consequently had a supreme right to speak in St. Peter’s
name! Nor is there, in the domain of fact, the least reason
for believing that either Pippin or the Pope regarded this
impersonation of St. Peter as anything more than a
specially earnest and solemn mode of writing. To such
as look at this letter with the eyes neither of Pippin nor
the Pope, but with non-Catholic? and nineteenth century

ii. 291, has a few jocose remarks on this emergency provoking St.
Peter to write, when even Arianism, etc., could not move him. Kellet
(S¢4. Gregory, etc.), p. 96, amuses himself by speaking of the letter as a
‘papal forgery, and Villemain, Zzfe of St. Gregory VII. i. 114, even
assures his readers that this letter ‘professed to be miraculous’. It
is really wonderful how men can let their imaginations run on. As a
corrective for this baseless rhetoric, take even Gibbon (Decline, etc., iii.
p. 365, note): “The enemies of the popes have charged them with
fraud and blasphemy ; yet they surely meant to persuade rather than
deceive. This introduction of the dead, or of immortals, was familiar
to the ancient orators.”

1 To these reflections may be added this, that it was anciently the
custom in charters, in which a ‘church’ was one of the co-interested
parties, to replace the name of the said church with that of the name
of the saint who was its patron or founder. (Poujoulat, ii. 211, quoting
Ozanam, Etudes germaniques, ceuvres comp., iv. p. 233).

» Non-Catholic writers are very fond of quoting a criticism of Fleury
on this letter. We can only say that the injustice of the remarks in the
passage in question is one of the too many proofs of the Gallican
tendencies of its author.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IU. 309

ideas, not modified by a few grains of common sense, it
may doubtless appear sufficiently awful.

The superscription of the letter is as follows: “Peter,
called to apostleship by Jesus Christ, the Son of the living
God;.... and, through me, the whole Catholic and
Apostolic Roman Church of God, .... and Stephen the
head of that same Church .... to the most excellent
men Pippin, Charles and Carlomann, and to all the clergy
and people of the Franks.”

After this the letter begins: “I, Peter the apostle, have
been set by the power of Christ, the son of the living
God, to be a light to the whole world.... To this
apostolic Roman Church of God, entrusted to me,
your hope of future reward is attached. And so I, who
have adopted you as sons, call on you to defend this
Roman state from the hands of its enemies...
Our Lady also in like manner and all the saints
exhort you to have compassion on this city. ... Give
help to my people of Rome now, that I may be able to
help you hereafter at the day of judgment... . Of all?
peoples, your nation of the Franks has shown itself most
well disposed towards me; and so, by the hands of my
vicar, I have entrusted to you, to be delivered, from its
enemies, the Church, which the Lord has given into my
keeping. ... If you come quickly to my aid, then, helped
by my prayers, you will, after overcoming your enemies
in this life, and being happy here, enjoy the gifts of eternal
life; but if, as I trust you will not, you delay your
assistance, know that you are cut off from eternal life.”

me
wri

Ss to
Pippin 1 in
the name
of St.
Peter, 755,

Whilst this letter is on its way to the Frankish monarch, The siege

1 Ep. 10 G., ap. Migne, Zc., p. 121. “Declaratum quippe est, quod
super omnes gentes quze sub ccelo sunt, vestra Francorum gens, prona
mihi, ap. Dei Petro, exstitit ; et ideo ecclesiam, quam mihi Dominus
tradidit, vobis per manus vicarii mei commendavi ad liberandum de

manibus inimicorum.”

of Rome.

310 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL

for the sake of those who love to read of ‘war and war’s
alarms, we would be glad to give a description of this
first sustained siege of Rome that we have yet had to
chronicle. But few details of it have come down to us.
The Pope’s letters to Pippin describe the approach of the
Lombard forces in three great divisions. The army of
Tuscany blockaded the entire west front of the city; that
is to say, they were encamped along the length of the
Tiber, which runs pretty well north and south through
the city, from the gate of St. Peter and that: of St
Pancratius (the old Aurelian gate) to that known as
the Porta Portuensis. The royal standard was planted
opposite the Salarian; and so the king’s division would
blockade the north and part of the east of the city; the
rest of the east wall and the south of the city, to the gates
of St. John and St. Paul, were watched by the army of
Beneventum. The command of the waterway to the sea,
however, seems to have remained with the besieged, as
it was by sea that the Pope’s envoys contrived to get to
Pippin. It should be noted in passing that the fact that
the Lombards never became a naval power in any sense
of the term is one of the many proofs of the barbaric
condition in which their nation ever remained. Nor had
they even such knowledge of engineering as is necessary
to subdue walled cities. So that, though the Pope speaks
of the various engines+ and contrivances with which
they assaulted the city, it held out month after month.
Distinguished in the defence of the city was the abbot
Werner, whom the Pope describes as ever on the walls
in his cuirass. We can well imagine this bold Teuton

1 “Prelia .... cum diversis machinis et adinventionibus plurimis
contra nos .... commiserunt.””. Ep. 9 G.; Migne, p. 112. Yet
Mr. Bryce, Holy Roman Empire, p. 39, lib. ed., blandly assures his
readers that “the safety of the city”... . was not “really endangered
by these attacks” |

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) II. 311

warrior-monk and his body of Franks doing yeoman
service against the Lombards. It would be doubtless
on account of his brave martial spirit that the Pope
entrusted to him the conveyance of his first two letters
to Pippin, after the siege had lasted some fifty-five days.
The letters of the Pope must have had a prompt effect Pippin
on Pippin. For as we are told by the Liber Pontificalis the march
that the siege of Rome lasted three months, and that Bere
Aistulf broke it up to resist Pippin in the north, we may
conclude that the Frankish monarch forced the passes of
the Alps for a second time about the month of April 756.
Whilst Pippin was thus engaged, there again arrived in
Rome, with more words, the imperial envoy John, the
Silentiary, accompanied by George, the Chief Secretary
of State. Scarcely would they believe the Pope when
he told them that Pippin was again on his way to free
the Roman duchy from the Lombards They resolved
to see for themselves. However, when, along with a
papal envoy, they reached Marseilles, they had the
mortification to find that what the Pope had told them
was only too true. Their one object was then to get
at Pippin by themselves, and before the envoy of the
Pope could obtain access to him. Accordingly they
used all the artifices in their power, and put as much
pressure on him as they could, to keep the Pope's
ambassador at Marseilles? Finding that he was bent
on going forward, George hurried into Italy by himself,
and overtook Pippin as he was drawing near to Pavia.
Offering him presents from the emperor, and promising
him more, the imperial secretary implored Pippin to hand
over the exarchate again into his masters hands. In

1 “Dubium habuerunt credendi.” ZL. P.
2 7g, “Nitebantur dolose missum Ap. Sedis detinere... . afili-
gentes eum valide.”

Aistulf
again
makes
peace, 756.

Aistulf’s
‘deed of
surrender,’
750.

312 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL.

vain. Pippin declared stoutly that he would not on any
account alienate it from the power of Blessed Peter and the
jurisdiction of the Roman Church and the Apostolic See.
Then on his oath he added: “It is not to please man that
I have so often engaged in battle. It is only for love of
Blessed Peter, and to obtain pardon of my sins. No amount
of treasure can move me to take back what I have once
offered to Blessed Peter.”?

Pippin then pushed on to Pavia, and began the siege
of it at once. In the autumn Aistulf was again at Pippin’s
feet. This time he did not escape so easily. He had to
pay a war indemnity, become tributary to the Frankish
king, acknowledging his dependence by an annual pay-
ment, and fulfil with regard to the Pope what he had
promised in the former treaty; and, as a further punish-
ment for his perfidy, he had to surrender to the Pope
the city of Comiaclum (Comacchio) in addition.?

As what follows is of considerable importance in
connection with the temporal power of the Holy See,
we will give it almost ‘verbatim’ in the words of the
Book of the Popes. “He (ae, Aistulf as is clear from

17. P. “Asserens isdem.... rex, nulla penitus ratione easdem
civitates a potestate B. Petri, et jure Ecclesiz Romane, vel Pontificis
Apostolicae Sedis quoquo modo alienari ; affirmans etiam sub juramento,
quod per nullius hominis favorem sese certamini szepius dedisset, nisi
pro amore B. Petri et venia delictorum ; asserens et hoc, quod nulla
eum thesauri copia suadere valeret, ut quod semel B. Petro obtulit,
auferret.” As we learn from one of Hadrian’s letters to Charlemagne
(Cod C., 56 G., ap. Migne, 57), that prince made a similar declaratior
to the effect that he had undertaken his war against Desiderius “non
aurum, neque gemmas vel litteras et homines conquirentes . , . . nisi
pro justitiis b. Petri exigendis et exaltatione S. Dei Ecclesize
perficienda,” etc.

2 Cf. L. P., Ann. Vet. Franc. ap. Migne, P. L., t. 98, p. 1416, and
the various annals, ap. 17. G. #.,i., etc. Comiaclum is to the south of
the principal arm of the Po.

3 As Gosselin, The Power of the Pope, i. p. 224 note, observes, most
moderns (Gregorovius, etc.) confuse this ‘donation’ of Aistulf with the

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IH. 313

the position in which the word—misit or emisit—occurs)
drew up in writing a donation of all the cities (which
he had to surrender) to be kept for ever by Blessed Peter,
the Holy Roman Church and the Pontiffs of the Apostolic
See, which deed! is still preserved in the archives of our
Holy Church. To take possession of the said cities,
the most Christian king of the Franks sent his counsellor,
the venerable abbot and priest Fulrad, and himself
returned to France. In company with envoys from
Aistulf, Fulrad went through the Pentapolis and Amilia,
took formal possession of the various cities, and with
the keys and hostages from each place, reached Rome.
There, on the confession of St. Peter, he deposited the
keys of Ravenna and the other cities of the exarchate,
along with Aistulfs donation. And to the same apostle?
and his vicar, and all his successors to be for ever possessed
and ordered by them, he handed over the following cities:
—Ravenna, Ariminum (Rimini), Pisaurum (Pesaro), Conca
(La Cattolica ?, on the coast below Rimini), Fanum (Fano),
Cesenze (Cesena), Senogallia (Sinigaglia), AXsium (Jesi),
Forum Pompilii (Forumpopuli), Forum Livii (Forli), with
the castle of Sassubium (Castro Caro?), Monteferetri
(Montefeltro), Acerragio®? (not yet identified), Montem
one previously drawn up by Pippin at Ponthion and Quiercy or
Kiersey. Cf sup., p. 301, and the notes, where constant reference to
this donation of Pippin is made by the Pope.

1 “ Quze (donatio) usque hactenus in archivio S. nostree Ecc. recondita
tenetinaee, 2.

2 “ Fidem apostolo, et ejus Vicario sanctissimo Papas, atque omnibus
ejus successoribus Pontificibus perenniter possidendas, atque dis-
ponendas tradidit, ze, Ravennam,” etc. After the use of such explicit
terms, it does not seem to require any elaborate discussion as to what
kind of ‘dominion’ the Pope had over the exarchate. He was here
clearly recognised ’ absolute ruler’ of it.

3 Some would find Acerragio in Arcevia, and Serra in a locality
called Serra dei Conti, both in the valley of Nevola, between Jesi and
Fossombrone. There are two other Serras—one near San Marini

314 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) III.

Lucati (Monte Luco), Serra (among the mountains
that separate Umbria from the March of Ancona), the
castle of San Marini (between Rimini and Pesaro), Bobium
(not Bobbio in Liguria, but Sarsina, in the Pentapolis),
Urbino, Callis (Cagli), Lucioli (Luceoli on the Flaminian
Way; the modern Cantiano), Eugubio (Gubbio), Comiaclum
(Comacchio), and Civitas Nariensis or Narni, which, though
belonging to the duchy of Rome, had been for some years
in the possession of the dukes of Spoleto.” These cities,
with the exception, of course, of Narni, meant practically
the exarchate of Ravenna,! considered as including the
two Pentapolises, zz. the territory bounded on the north
by the Po, on the west by the Panaro and the Apennines,
on the south by the Miseo (Musone), and on the east
by the Adriatic.

The Pope was now undisputed sovereign not only of
the ‘duchy of Rome, over which he had ruled with
rapidly-increasing power from the Iconoclast disturbances
in the times of Gregory II., but also of the ‘ exarchate.’
The authority, which the voluntary action of its inhabitants,

(Serra del Sasso) and the other near Castel Bolognese. Castrum
Sassubium is generally identified with Castro Caro. Montefeltro is
the same as San Leno. For Conca, some point to a place which used
to be inhabited, near the mouth of the Conca, a little to the north of
La Cattolica, between Rimini and Pesaro. (Cf Duchesne, Z. P,, i.
460.)

1 Hence Eginhard (Azmal., ad an. 755-6). “Redditamque sibi
(Pippino) Ravennam, et Pentapolim, et omnem Exarchatum ad
Ravennam pertinentem, ad S. Petrum tradidit.” In different MSS.
of the Z. P. there are one or two variations in the list of cities
mentioned in this donation. The list given above is not far wrong,
as all the places there mentioned occur in the confirmatory donations
of Charlemagne, or Louis the Pious, if not in both. Cf Theiner,
Cod. Dip., i. pp. 1, 2, 3. Certain it is that other cities of the exarchate
were named in the donations, as we shall soon see the Pope asking
Pippin to see that they are restored. Probably the above cities are
here named because they were surrendered at once,

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) III a1

in the first days of the ‘image-breaking’ troubles, had
given to the Pope in the exarchate, and which supplies
us with the reason why all the deeds and histories of this
period speak of the ‘donations’ of Pippin and Aistulf
as ‘restitutions,+ had now, by the valour and generosity
of Pippin, and the ‘indifference? of New Rome,’ developed
into full sovereignty. The subsequent course of this
history will, it is hoped, afford further evidence of the
truth of this proposition—anent the extent of the Pope’s
temporal power.

Stephen at once took possession of the exarchate.
Sergius, the archbishop of Ravenna, was naturally named
the Pope’s representative in the exarchate, as the most
important and powerful resident in that locality. But
the inferior officers, or at least many of them, were
sent out from Rome® There cannot, therefore, be
any doubt that henceforth the Pope is the real lord
of the exarchate.

As, however, some authors have imagined that by ie
bestowing the dignity of ‘patrician of the Romans’ on cian mec
Pippin and his sons, Pope Stephen thereby limited his pare oN
own power in the papal states, it will be to the point
here to inquire into what was connoted by that title.
According to Gibbon,* it was Constantine who “revived

1 Cf. sup., Pp. 305.

2 Mr. Bury remarks (History of Later Roman Empire, ii. 502) that,
among other causes that made the donation of Pippin bring into being
an independent papal state, was the ‘indifference of New Rome.’

3 This is certain from a letter (Cod. C., 49 G., ap. Migne, 52) of
Hadrian I. to Charlemagne. “Ipse noster predecessor (Stephanus)
cunctas actiones ejusdem exarchatus ad peragendum distribuebat, et
omnes actores ab hac urbe Romana preecepta earundem actionum

accipiebant. Nam et judices....in eadem Ravennatium urbe
residentes ab hac Romana urbe direxit.” Cf Cod. C., ep. 54 G., ap.
Migne, 54.

4 Decline, etc., i. 363. Cf. iii. c. 49, p. 367; Gosselin’s Power of the

316 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) Il.

the title of patricians, but he revived it as a personal,
not as an hereditary distinction (as it used to be in the
palmy days of old Rome). They yielded only to the
transient superiority of the annual consuls. But they
enjoyed the pre-eminence over all the great officers of
State, with the most familiar access to the person of the
prince. This honourable rank was bestowed on them for
life; and as they were usually favourites, and ministers
who had grown old in the imperial court, the true
etymology of the word was perverted by ignorance and
flattery ; and the patricians of Constantine were reverenced
as the adopted Fathers of the emperor and the republic.”
They, ze, the patricians, were thus the highest class in
the empire; from their ranks came the exarchs and the
other higher officers of the State; and the name ‘ patrician’
itself was often used to denote some high office for which
there was another more distinctive or peculiar name.
Thus we often read of the ‘patricians of Italy, Africa,
etc., instead of ‘exarchs’ of Italy, etc. And so it came
to be thought that the title of ‘patrician’ implied “the
duty of protecting and defending those provinces.’ Hence
Pippin spoke of himself* as ‘defender’ of the Holy

Pope, i. p. 219, note 3; and especially Jungmann, Déss. H. E£., xiv.
§ 51.

1 In the Annal. vet. Franc., ap. Migne, P. L., 98, p. 1415, Pippin
requests Aistulf not to afflict the Roman Church “ cujus ille defensor per
ordinationem divinam fuerat.” Correspondingly in the various letters
of the Codex Carolinus, Pippin is called ‘ Defender’ of the Church by
the Pope. The account of ‘Patrician of the Romans, given by
Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii. p. 281f.) cannot be said to be quite
accurate. He asserts that Pippin never makes use of this title. A
plate of one of Pippin’s coins, however, is given by Daniel (Aisz. de
France, i. p. 370), on which the letters R. P. are a further proof that
Pippin did use the title. Gregorovius is nevertheless, we think, correct
in concluding that ‘with regard to Pippin’s time,’ Patriczan is much the
same as Advocate of the Church. And so Cantu, Storia degli Italiani
(c. 68 v. 248): “Il titolo di patrizio, esprimeva il fatrono della Chiesa,

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IL. 317

Roman Church; and so was he spoken of by the Pope.
Whatever, then, may have been the social position of a
patrician, or whatever the power he possessed, it is certain
that the emperor, in creating one, neither created a
superior nor an independent ruler. Even if the patrician
represented the sovereign, he still remained second and
subject to the emperor. Any power he exercised in the
provinces he administered in his master’s name, and it
was but delegated power. And when the popes named
the Frankish kings ‘patricians of the Romans, they did
not create officials who were to exercise power over the
Romans independent of themselves. The patriciate, what-
ever else it implied, at least argued dependence. In
appointing Pippin ‘patrician of the Romans, Stephen
III. appointed him to be his defender and helper. It is
true that history has often shown that there is danger in
calling in ‘defenders.’ Powerful protectors often become
the lords and masters of those whom they ‘protect.’
People with the best of intentions often find it hard to
discriminate between the end of protection and the
beginning of interference. We need not then be sur-
prised if the Frankish rulers sometimes acted as if they
were kings, and not simply patricians of the Romans.
Towards the close of the year 756, the treacherous and Death of

cruel Aistulf, whilst meditating how he might most con- ne
veniently break his oaths to Pippin, lost his life while
hunting. Desiderius, Duke of Istria,’ forthwith proclaimed
himself king, but, to his astonishment, met with a rival in

dei poveri e degli oppressi.” Bury (Later Roman Empire, ii. 501) also
speaks to the same effect.

1 Not of ‘Tuscany, as he is often mistakenly called. (Cf. Muratori,
Annal.,ad an. 756.) It is on the authority of the dum. Lauriss. and
those of Einhard (ad an. 756) that it is stated that Aistulf was engaged
in preparing to violate his oaths. Cf ep. Steph., ap. Cod. C., 11 G.,
“fidem suam temptans.”

318 STEPHEN IJ. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL

Ratchis. Whether it was that he had grown tired of the
cloister, and once more sighed after the bustle of the
world, or whether it was that he so far despised}
Desiderius that he thought that such a man could never
be allowed to succeed his brother, sure it is that Ratchis
suddenly left his monastery and took up arms to oppose
the pretensions of Desiderius. The latter turned to the
Pope, and promised, on condition of obtaining his help,
“to restore? the cities which still remained in the hands
of the Lombards (ze, of course, certain cities in the
exarchate), and, moreover, to present the Pope with a
large sum of money.” Acting on the advice of Fulrad,
Stephen sent to Desiderius, his brother, the deacon Paul,
one of his counsellors Christopher, and the abbot Fulrad
himself. Desiderius renewed in writing the previous pro-
mises he had made by word of mouth. The Pope, ac-
cordingly, heartily embraced his cause, sending a certain
‘venerable priest Stephen’ to Ratchis, to point out to
him his duty of returning to his monastery, and the
abbot Fulrad with his Franks to the aid of Desiderius.
The result of these measures was that the whole difficulty
was settled without bloodshed. Ratchis again withdrew
to his monastery, and Desiderius was recognised as king
about March 757. Before Stephen died, there had been
surrendered to him the cities of Faventia (Faenza), along
with the castle (castellum, a fortified place) of Tiberiacum
(Bagnacavallo), Cavello, and the entire duchy of Ferrara.‘

1 “ Cujus (Desiderii) personam despectui habens.” (Z.P.) “ Guber-
navit .... Ratchis ....a Decembrio usque Martium”— Catal.
Reg. Langob. (ap. JZ. G. SS. Lang., p. 503).

2 “Tnsuper et reipublicee se redditurum professus est civitates, quae
remanserant, immo et copiosa daturum munera.” JZ, P.

ILE:

* 16. Desiderius kept Bologna and Imola, and probably Ancona,
Osimo and Humana, till the fall of his kingdom.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN GLE: a BEE 319

Much of all this is confirmed by the last extant letter Last letter
of the Pope to the king of the Franks. This letter was cee
written in the beginning of the year 757.1 After thank- 7”
ing Pippin very effusively, Stephen begs him to see that
the rest of the cities, etc., of the exarchate be restored
to the Church, because it stood to reason and was in
accordance with the express declaration of the abbot
Fulrad, ‘who had inspected everything, that the people
in their neighbourhood could not live in security with-
out the possession of those cities “which? had always
been joined with them under one government.”

Then, in language stronger than, as events go, we should
expect to hear in these days, but which the recollection
of the treachery and fearful barbarity of Aistulf. caused
to flow spontaneously from the Pope’s pen, Stephen went
on: “That tyrant, follower of the devil, devourer of
Christian blood, and destroyer of God’s churches, Aistulf,
has, by the judgment of God, been struck dead and buried
in hell.” By his own influence and that of the abbot
Fulrad, the Pope continued, Desiderius, ‘a most mild
man, had been declared king, and had undertaken, on
oath, “in the presence of Fulrad, to restore to Blessed
Peter the remaining cities (of the exarchate), viz.,
Faventia, Imola and Ferrara, with their territories, as
well as Ausimus (Osimo), Ancona, Humanum; and

1 And not at the close of 756, as it is dated in ei Epa tt. G:,
Migne, 2é., p. 126.

2 “Quod nequaquam ipse populus vivere possit extra eorum fines et
territoria atque possessiones, absque civitatibus illis, que semper cum
eis sub unius dominii ditione erant connexze,” z6. Many authors who
represent the popes of this period as ever grasping for more and more
territory, do not take sufficient notice of such important passages as
the above. If the popes had to rule the exarchate, it is very plain
that as long as many important fortified places in it were in the hands
of their enemies, the Lombards, the work of government would be
impossible,

The Pope
and the
Greeks,

320 STEPHEN Ii. AND STEPHEN (II.) It.

afterwards through Duke Garinodus, and Grimoald, he
promised that Bononia (Bologna), with its territories,
should be restored to us; and he promised ever to
remain at peace with that same Church of God and our
people. He (Desiderius) likewise asked us to beg you
to promise peace and concord with himself and the
whole Lombard nation.” Hence the Pope begs Pippin
to grant his request in behalf of Desiderius, “if, as he
(Desiderius) has promised, he render full justice to the
Church, the republic of the Romans and Blessed Peter,
and with his nation continue in peace with the Church
and our people, as is set forth in the treaties which you
(Pippin) have confirmed.” Meanwhile Pippin is asked
to apply quiet pressure, so that Desiderius will not fail
to make the required restorations; and, in his negotia-
tions with the Greeks, so to act “that the holy Catholic
and Apostolic faith may through you remain inviolate
for ever, and that the Holy Church of God may be
rendered free and secure from their pestiferous malice, and
may recover its property’; so that the ‘service’ of the
lamps in the churches may not diminish, and that there
may be food in abundance for the poor and the pilgrim.”

As we have remarked, Stephen lived to see the
‘restoration’ of some of the cities mentioned in this
letter, : but not all. Desiderius was -too much of a
Lombard to be faithful to his word. Stephen’s suc-
cessor had to continue the struggle for the complete
restitution of the exarchate.

Like his predecessors, Stephen did not fail, soon after
his accession, to remind? Constantine that it was his

1 Ep. 11. There is doubtless here reference to the patrimonies of
Calabria and Sicily seized by Leo the Isaurian.

2 Cf. Ep. Hadriani I., ap. Mansi, xii. 1o61—the letter quoted at the
beginning of the second session of the Seventh General Council.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) Itt. 321

duty to restore the sacred images. His efforts were,
however, no more successful than those which had been
already made from Rome. Occupied for many years
with the rebellion of Artavasdus, plagues, and wars with
the Saracens, Constantine at length found time to make
serious efforts to put down image worship. In the same
year that he received the Pope’s letter in behalf of the
sacred images, Constantine caused a number of delibera-
tive assemblies (sz/entia) to be held in the different cities,
with the object of deluding! the people into embracing
his views. And then, after the death of Anastasius,
patriarch of Constantinople, the emperor summoned (754) The ‘ mock
a council to meet in the Hieria Palace near Chalcedon. eae
Though none of the patriarchal Sees were represented "”” ee
in the council, no less than 338 bishops were ready at
the bidding of an emperor to pass one decree after
another against the worship of images, “sanctioning?
their private opinions by their private authority.” While
denouncing ‘the evil art of painting, the council found
it also necessary to denounce those who rob churches

1 Theoph. ad an, 744. “ Populum ad suam sententiam amplexandam
dolose pertraxit.”

2 The words of Theophanes, ad an. 745. All we know of the doings
of this ‘conciliabule’ is what the Seventh CEcumenical Council has
preserved for us in its Sixth Session. Cf Héfélé, v. p. 307 (Eng. trans.).
On this assembly the life of St. Stephen the Younger (written 808) may
be also consulted. To the bishops who, maintaining that their gather-
ing was an cecumenical council, tried to bring Stephen over to their
side, the saint answered : “ How can that be a general council to which
the bishop of Rome has not given his sanction? For by the canons,
ecclesiastical affairs cannot be settled without him.” ‘“ Quanam ratione
vestram Synodum (Ecumenicam dicitis, quam neque approbavit
Romanus pontifex (quamquam canone prescribitur res ecclesiasticas
absque Papa Rome constitui non debere) neque Alexandrinus,” etc.
(Vita S. Steph., ap. Montfaucon, Amalecta Greca). Zonaras, a later
Greek author, in his Anmals (xv. c. 6): “Eum concursum profanorum
hominum, Synodum CEcumenicam appellare non dubitavit.”

VOL a blll, 21

St. Boni-
face writes
to the
Pope, 755.

322 STEPHEN I!l. AND STEPHEN (II.) IL

“under the pretence of destroying images,’ a method of
proceeding by no means unknown to religious reformers
who have appeared in England during the last three
centuries. The immediate result of this base truckling
of the Byzantine bishop to the emperor was a whole-
sale destruction of beautiful monuments and a general
flight from the neighbourhood of Constantinople of the
monks, who were staunch opponents of the despotic
decrees of Constantine. Thus (interfering in the domain
of conscience, and decreeing deposition to those of the
secular clergy who would not conform to his will, and
ordering that recalcitrant monks and laymen should be
handed over to the arm of the State) was Constantine
occupied when the whole undivided energies of himself
and the empire should have been devoted to combating
the Saracens and Bulgarians.

After following the history of St. Boniface through
three successive pontificates, we have now only to speak
of the closing year of his life (755). In the beginning
of that year he wrote? to Pope Stephen to beg him to
act towards him (Boniface) as his predecessors had done.
For they had helped and encouraged him by the authority
of their letters. Any good he may have done for the
past thirty-six years (since 719) for the Roman Church
he desires to continue ; and he promises® with all readi-

1 Ep. gt, ed. S.; 108 MZ. G. 4.

2 See above, p. 156.

3 “Si autem minus perite aut injuste a me factum aliquid reperitur,
judicio Romanze (ecclesize) prompta voluntate et humilitate emendare
me velle spondeo” (Ep., /.c.). From this letter it is plain that Boniface
had had no communication with Pope Stephen before this date. But
Mr. Kellet, Pofe Gregory the Great, p. 95, among his other numerous
mistakes, writes as follows: “A dispute had meanwhile (during the
Pope’s visit to France) arisen between Boniface and the Pope.
Stephen had infringed Boniface’s metropolitan rights by ordaining a
bishop of Metz !” etc. Had the Pope ordained anybody, anywhere, for

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IL 323

ness and humility to amend anything that that Church
may find wanting in his conduct. In conclusion he
begs the Pope not to be annoyed that he has not
written to him before, because he has had on his hands
the restoration of no less than thirty churches, burnt in
one of the inroads of the pagans (Saxons). .

Soon after this first letter Boniface despatched another
tothe Pope. It appears that Hildebert, Bishop of Cologne,
claimed jurisdiction over Utrecht (a place that the saint
himself had formerly furnished with a bishop, in succession
to St. Willibrord, or Clement, the apostle of the Frisians),
and did not wish it to remain “an episcopal See! subject
to the apostolic See, with a special mission for the con-
version of the Frisians.” But St. Boniface gave Hildebert
to understand that the regulations of Pope Sergius in the
matter must be adhered to, and wrote to Stephen to ask
him to confirm his (Boniface’s) decision if it seemed good

The juris-
diction of
Utrecht,
755°

to his Holiness. As Utrecht remained an episcopal See,

the Pope must have confirmed the saint’s action.

And now, feeling that his end must be drawing nigh—
for had he not passed the allotted threescore years and
ten ?>—Boniface, sighing for the martyr’s crown, wished to
end his missionary labours where he had begun them, viz.,

any See, Boniface at any rate, as even the letter cited above in the text
proves, would never have objected. But Chrodegang had been bishop
of Metz from 742! He died in 766. If Mr. Kellet has not made the
assertion at second hand, he must have drawn on the Passio S.
Bonifatit, a work written after the year 1011, and by one “ who, at once
credulous and destitute of any critical faculty, committed to writing
whatever report had brought to his ears,’ says the learned Jew, P.
Jaffé, in his introduction to the Vite S. Bonif. It is true that the Pope
gave Chrodegang the ‘pallium’ for his exertions in his (the Pope’s)
behalf. Cf LZ. P. in vit., and Paul the Deacon, De Epp. Met,,
ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 95, and the list of the bishops of Metz there
given.

1 From this second letter of St. Boniface to Pope Stephen (Ep. 97
ed. S.; 109 M. G. #7.).

Death of

St. Boni-

face, June
5, 755+

324 STEPHEN 11. AND STEPHEN (II.) Il.

in Frisia. For in that country a considerable number
of the people were still savage pagans. Accordingly, to
provide for his flock, with the consent of Pippin and the
clergy and nobility of his diocese, he consecrated his friend,
countryman, and fellow-labourer, Lul, as his successor,
in accordance with permission previously obtained from
Rome, as Othlo! is careful to add. Then after com-
mending those who had worked so well with him to the
care of King Pippin, he took boat for Frisia, and, with a
large number of devoted followers, received the crown of
martyrdom (June 5, 755) on the plains of Dockum, near the
stream of Bordue (Bordau). Thus, laying down his life
for the truth he had so long preached, did Boniface
gloriously terminate a useful and noble career, a career
which elicits, indeed, the praise ot God himself—* How
beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that
bringeth good tidings, and that preacheth peace: of
him that sheweth forth good, that preacheth salvation!”
(Isa. lii. 7)—but a career which many men think of little
account. “The good man dieth, and no one taketh any
heed.” But it is men such as Boniface that are the truly
great. Many unreflectingly bestow the title of ‘ Great’
upon those who have really been their scourges, who have
deluged the world in blood, and have but degraded and
brutalised our race. The reflecting will, however, see
that it is those who have devoted their strength and
energy to raising men from the level of the brute creation,
and inspiring them with high and noble thoughts, who
have the strongest claim on our gratitude, and whose
memory we can never hold in honour enough.

Before, however, we take our final leave of Boniface

1 Cf. Willibaldi zz w7t, S. Bon., c. 8, and Othlo (ed. Jaffé, p. 83),

‘Nam ab apostolico praesule jam antea eundem pro se ordinandum
impetravit.” Cf. sup., p. 236.

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) Ill. 325

and his letters, which shed so much light on the history
of his times, we may be permitted another word or two
in connection with this great Englishman. With pardon-
able patriotism Bishop Healy endeavours to claim him as
a countryman. “There is very good reason to believe,”
he says,! “that Boniface, though born in England, was
himself of Irish origin.” What that reason is we do
not know; but there are two passages to be found among
his letters which seem to show that he himself acknow-
ledged that he was English not merely by birth but by
descent. Asking the English to pray for the conversion
of their continental brethren (the Saxons), he writes?:
“Pity those who are wont to say, ‘We are of the same
flesh and blood.’” And, on the other hand, Torthelm,
writing to him from England, says*: “Who would not
exult and rejoice in your good works that our race (gens
nostra) may believe in Christ, the Omnipotent God?” In
the first case Winfrid undoubtedly seems to identify
himself with the English to whom he is writing, and
with the Saxons about whom he is speaking, and in
the second case Torthelm would certainly seem to class
Winfrid himself and the English as men of one race
with the Saxons.

The other word we would say is this. Winfrid’s
letters are so full of grave matters in connection with
Church or State, that it is exceptional to find in them
remarks of a lighter kind. When, however, they are found,
they must not be passed by unnoticed, as they are of the
first importance in throwing light on his character, and do
no little to increase the warmth of our feelings towards
him. In writing* to Egbert of York, “In place of a kiss,”

1 Jyeland’s Schools, p. 568, etc.
2 Ep. 46 D. 247 D.
$91 D, “Vice osculi duas vini cupellas . . , . transmisimus,”

Church
restora-
tion.

Rebellion
of Sergius
of Ravenna.

326 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II) IIL

he says, “I have sent you a little wine, and I beg you by
the bond of love between us, spend in consequence a
happy day with your brethren!”

Stephen, too, did his share in the matter of the preser-
vation of the ancient buildings of Rome. Among his
other restorations! is mentioned that of the basilica of
St. Lawrence, ‘super S. Clementem,’ in the third region.
This we take to be the third ecclesiastical region, which
is thought to have included the third (Isis and Serapis)
and the fifth (Esquiline) civil regions; and hence it may
be supposed that the particular basilica mentioned is
St. Lawrence’s? ‘in Formoso,’ or ‘in Panisperna, as it is
variously called. This basilica was built on the highest
point of the Viminal hill, and on the spot where the
saint was martyred.

Before Stephen died he had to face trouble from
within as well as from without in the matter of his
sovereign rights in the exarchate. It would seem that he
had named Sergius, the archbishop of Ravenna (¢. 752-770),
his deputy-governor over the exarchate. Sergius, however,
had not long tasted power, ere he thought he would
like it for himself. He, accordingly, began to rule
the exarchate as though he were its independent
ruler. Naturally displeased at this, Stephen had him
promptly conveyed to Rome*—in what year cannot be

1 Cf. Gregorovius, Rome, etc., il. 314.

? There are altogether (inclusive of the one outside the walls) six
churches in Rome dedicated to St. Lawrence. Cf Gregor., 2b., i. 104 ;
Miley, Pagal States, i. 402. Duchesne (Z. P., i. 457) identifies this
church with a church of St. Lawrence ad Taurellum, spoken of in
the life of Hadrian I. There was a region De Zauro above St.’
Clement’s, between it and St. Peter’s ad vincula.

3.“ Qui (Stephanus) archiepiscopum Sergium exinde abstulit, dum
contra ejus voluntatem agere spiritu superbiee nitebatur.” Ep. Had.
I., ad Carol. Reg. (Cod. C., 49 G., Migne, ep. 52). Cf Agnellus (in vit.
Serg.,c. 4,ap. &. Z, S,, ii. pt. i.), and Muratori, Azmal., ad ann. 757, 759,

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (II.) IIL. 3275

ascertained—and there he had to remain during the rest
of Stephen’s life. On this and on other counts he was
examined at Rome; and, from a letter! of Pope Paul I.
to Pippin, it is clear that, though that Pope was pushing
on Sergius’ cause, he had not then (757) been restored
to his See. By the year 761, however, Sergius was again
in possession of his See, and acting as a true? and loyal
subject of the Pope. Men easily find imitators of their
evil deeds; the disloyalty of Sergius found an imitator
in Archbishop Leo (770-777) in the time of Pope Hadrian.

In case the spiteful gossip, Agnellus of Ravenna, may Salis ie
have preserved for us any true details concerning Sergius according
amidst much that is certainly false, we will give the aah
story of the archbishop of Ravenna as it appears
in the pages of the silly abbot of St. Mary’s and St.
Bartholomew’s. Considering that Archbishop Sergius
only died some thirty-five years before the birth of
Agnellus, it is clear that that worthy could not have
taken the slightest pains to find out the truth of what
he relates. For he confuses Stephen (II). III. with
Zachary, and what was done by Stephen III. he assigns
to Pope Paul, and vice versa. He plays equally fast and
loose with the Lombard kings, and makes Aistulf. change
places with Liutprand, and in his three-page biography

770, etc. As Agnellus is not very trustworthy for events that occurred
before his own time, and as he is hostile to the popes, as Muratori, and
even Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii. 333 n.), observe, no credence can be
given to the details of this affair between Sergius and the Pope, as
found in his mutilated history. Of the extent of the civil jurisdiction
of Sergius, he is likely enough correct: “He judged (judicavit) from
the confines of Persiceto (near Modena) all the Pentapolis as far as
Tuscany, and Mensam Walani (ad Mensam Walani?, ad amnem (?)
Walani, the river Volano), like an exarch, and managed everything as
the Romans now do.”

1 Cod. C., 14 G., ap. Migne, ep. 13, ad an. 758.

2 Cod. C., 31 G.; 26. ap. Migne.

328 STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) III.

gives frequent occasion to his learned modern editor
(Holder-Egger) to note “this is false,” “this fabulous,”
and “this is very doubtful and fabulous.”

A layman and married, Sergius, while still young, was
elected to the See of Ravenna, probably by the influence
of the Lombard king Aistulf. This, indeed, is not stated
by Agnellus, but he tells us later that when Sergius
came into collision with Rome, he was relying on the
support of the Lombard king. His wife became a
deaconess and retired to a convent. Succeeding in satisfy-
ing or hoodwinking the Pope in the matter of his election,
he was consecrated at Rome. Supported by the papal
authority (apostolica auctoritate muniente), and helped by
his own bland words, he got the better of a schismatical
opposition to him on the part of his clergy. According
to Agnellus, Sergius lost favour at Rome because he did
not go to meet the Pope (Stephen III.) on the occasion
of his journey to Hrancza. The real cause was doubtless
as stated above, and hence, no doubt, he was not brought
to Rome till after the cession (756) of Ravenna to Pope
Stephen. Hence there can be no difficulty in believing
that he failed to obtain the support of Aistulf at such a
juncture. And even according to Agnellus he was brought
to Rome by his own citizens. The abbot continues:
Arrived in Rome, he was brought before a synod to be
deprived of his episcopal rank. And thus was he ad-
dressed by the Apostolicus (the Pope): “ You are a neo-
phyte; you did not belong to the (clerical) fold, nor had
you served in the church of Ravenna, as the canons require.
You took possession of the See like a robber, and, driving
away those who were worthy of the Church’s honours,
you obtained possession of the See by secular favour
and force.” To this Sergius replied: “I obtained the See
not by my ambition, but by the unanimous election of the

STEPHEN II. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL. 329

clergy and people. By the canonical questions you put
to me yourself, you learnt all about me—that I had a
wife, and had been elected while still a layman; and yet
you said there was no impediment, and consecrated me
yourself.” It seems certain, however, that he was conse-
crated by Pope Zachary. On hearing this defence, opinions
were divided, and at length the bishops declared they
could not judge a superior. Thereupon the Pope angrily
declared that on the following day he would himself tear
the pallium from the neck of Sergius. But, says Agnellus,
“by the judgment of God” he died during the night.
At dawn Paul, the brother of the deceased pontiff, came
to Sergius, who had passed the whole night in prayer,
and asked the archbishop what he would give him if
allowed to return home in peace and with increased
honour. The captive at once promised Paul the treasures
of the church of Ravenna. Whether this compact be-
came known or not, Sergius, even according to Agnellus,
got but a poor welcome on his return to Ravenna when
released. Paul, however, was very nearly getting a much
rougher one when he came to claim the treasures. Some
of the clergy proposed to ‘suffocate’ the Pope, others to
throw him down a cistern when he was looking for the
treasures. Wiser counsels, however, prevailed; and in
order, as one of them put it, that the Pope might depart
with honour, their hands be kept unstained, the word of
their pastor preserved, and yet their treasure for the most
part maintained intact, it was resolved to hide as much
of it as they could without the knowledge ot the arch-
bishop. Paul, however, arrived on the scene in time to
get a considerable quantity of gold and precious vessels.
Moreover, evidently becoming acquainted with the designs
against his life, he managed to bring it about that the
conspirators were sent to Rome, among them being the

330 STEPHEN IJ. AND STEPHEN (IL) IIL

grandfather of Agnellus himself. They were there im-
prisoned for life. Though most of this narrative of
Agnellus is unworthy of the slightest credence, there
may lurk some grain of truth beneath it all. At any
rate, it is not without its value as a specimen of the style
of the worthy abbot of Ravenna, and as showing his
weight as an historian. His imagination is quite sug-
gestive of that of Matthew of Paris.

Poe of In the midst of his struggles against enemies from

Stephen, within and without, Stephen fell ill. Tenderly was he

re nursed by his brother and successor Paul and by his
friends. But to no purpose. Death found him out; and
he was buried with great pomp in St. Peter’s, April 26, 757.
“ His,” writes! Dr. Hodgkin, “is certainly one of the great
epoch-making names in the list of bishops of Rome. As
Leo the First had turned aside the terrible Hun, and
had triumphed over the Eastern theologians, as Gregory
the Great had consolidated his spiritual dominion over
Western Europe, and rescued for it a great province from
heathendom, so Stephen II. won for himself and his suc-
cessors the sovereignty over some of the fairest regions of
Italy, gave a deadly blow to the hereditary Lombard
enemy, and in fact, if not in name, began that long line
of Pope-kings which ended in our own day in the person
of the ninth Pius,”

The one-line epitaph ? of Peter Mallius,

Subjacet hic Stephanus Romanus Papa Secundus,
is thought to be only the first line of a fuller production.

1 Jialy, etc., vil. 243. eel Pt. AG2:

Sis PA Geb
A.D. 757-767.

pete) ales

Sources—A short contemporary Zzfe in the Liber Pontificalis.
Thirty-one letters in the Codex Carolinus, all addressed to
Pippin, except one or two to his sons Charles and Carlomann.
With a few exceptions the order and dates assigned to the letters
of Paul in the latest edition of the Codex (MZ. G. Epp. ITT.) are
the same as those in the edition of Jaffé. The latest edition, that
of Gundlach (G.), is the one cited below. The Chronicles,

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE KING OF THE
EAST, LOMBARDS. FRANKS.
Constantine (V.), Desiderius, 756-774. Pippin the Short,
Copronymus, 741-775. 752-768.

To write the history of Paul I. is far from an easy task. Difficulty
The letters in the Coder are practically all undated. the life cf
The answers to them are not forthcoming. And as it on

is from the Caroline Code that most of the details of

the life of Paul have to be gathered, it will be readily
understood that the view of the character of this Pope
presented by an historian may largely depend on the
chronological order in which he decides to arrange Paul’s
letters. And each succeeding editor of them has arranged

them differently! The order adopted by Cenni, the most

Charge
against
Paul.

332 ST. PAUL I.

widely known editor of the Caroline Codex,’ is often
considerably different from that given by Jaffé and
Gundlach.

Another reason that makes the biography of Paul hard
to deal with is that we have to treat rather of the fleeting
shadows of great events than of actual transactions; the
events of his life were, so to speak, more negative than
positive. His reign was more distinguished by what might
have happened than by what really did take place ; ze., by
unceasing diplomatic effort, Paul prevented the Lombards
on the one hand, and the Greeks on the other, from effect-
ing anything of any moment against the newly-acquired
increased temporal power of the sovereign pontiff; he
caused great events never to get beyond the eve of
happening.

The exertions of Paul in the matter of the states of
the Church have furnished an occasion to certain his-
torians to sneer at him, as though he had no thought nor
time for anything else but to look after temporal affairs.
No doubt, to the reader who judges of things as they
look at first sight, these sneers may seem to be justified
by what they may read in this very biography. But one
must ever remember, in the words of the homely proverb,
that “the coat must always be cut in accordance with the
cloth.” And in the life of Paul, the historian has noth-
ing else to write about except his endeavours in behalf
of the temporalities of his See, because chance has pre-
served the record of his doings in that direction, while
the documents that would have enlightened us as to his
other deeds have perished,

Besides, it is only natural to suppose that the establish-

1 The most widely known because it was the edition reprinted by

Migne, P. L., t. 98. The later editions of Jaffé and Gundlach are
superior ones,

Sia eAUilal: 333

ment in the exarchate of a new authority, such as the papal,
would cause a great deal of trouble in any case, even if
there was peace without. And, after all, thirty-one letters
on one subject in the course of ten years is not much,
even if they were wholly occupied with the one subject,
which they are not.

It may be useful at the outset to give a short sketch Outline ot
of the principal occurrences of Paul’s pontificate, which creas
may serve as a guide through the details. The interests se
of Desiderius and Constantine V. would naturally lead
them to work to increase their power in Italy. Accord-
ingly, throughout the whole of his reign, Paul had to
face attacks or threatened attacks on his temporal
authority either from the Lombards, Greeks, or both.
Paul’s correspondence proves that to keep their indepen-
dence for his people was just as much as he was able to
effect. For, as may be well imagined, it took no little
exhortation and asking to induce Pippin to take sufficient
interest in the welfare of a distant people, when there
were no immediate and tangible advantages to be gained
for himself by his exertions. The more so that he had
his own difficulties in Bavaria, and especially in Aquitaine.
It was only the untiring watchfulness of Paul, and his
ceaseless efforts in sustaining the goodwill of Pippin, that
saved Rome from the truly ‘unspeakable’ misfortune of
falling into the hands of the Greeks or Lombards. It
was the latter of these two powers that gave the most
trouble at the beginning? of Paul’s reign. Then, from
fear of Pippin, Desiderius toned down in his dreams
of aggrandisement, and we shall find the Pope writing
to Pippin to direct Desiderius to protect him (the Pope)
against the Greeks. The trouble with MDesiderius was
not smoothed over before the difficulties with the

i Cf, Epp.16, 16, 17, etc., edd. J. and G,

Disputed

election of

334 ST. PAUL IL

Greeks! began. Ina word, the political situation in the time
of Paul I. may be thus summarised. On the one hand, on
the defensive, was the Pope relying on Pippin; and, on
the other, on the offensive, were the Lombards and the
Empire. Desiderius was striving for territory ; Constantine
for both territory and heresy (Iconoclasm). Whether from

* mutual jealousy or mistrust, or because the Bulgarians

and Saracens gave the Greeks enough to fully occupy
their thoughts, there was not any practical co-operation
between the Lombards and the Greeks. But so irate
were the latter against the Pope for his opposition to them,
that they affected to consider him as a tool in the hands
of the primicerius Christopher, whom we shall see playing
a very important part, at least under Stephen IV.

Stephen III. was still lying ill in the Lateran Palace,

Paul, April when certain eager partisans began to make preparations

757-

for the election of their own candidate. A number of
them, to be ready, gathered together in the house of
the archdeacon Theophylactus. But a still larger number
both of the magistracy (judices) and the people made
known their adhesion to Paul. However, as the papal
biographer observes, Paul himself did not move in the
matter, but continued his devoted attention to his dying
brother. After the death of Stephen, the party in favour

1 Certain authors (eg. Mr. Bryce, Holy Roman Empire, p. 40)
suppose that at this time, and even much later, the popes admitted a
“nominal supremacy of the Eastern Emperor,” because they employed
“the years of his reign to date documents.” Apart from the fact that
not a single letter of Paul in the Codex Carolinus is so dated, and from
other considerations which the text will furnish to show that no manner
of supremacy of the Greeks was henceforth acknowledged by the popes,
it would be as reasonable to suppose that the Goths of Spain
acknowledged that supremacy because their chronicles show that
they dated events by the reigns of the Greek emperors. (Cf Chron.
Albeldense, etc., ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 129.) And the custom spoken of

by Mr. Bryce seems to have ceased as early as 772. Cf. Hodgkin,
Italy, vii. 253.

Sis 1vaQOs iy Ie 335

of Paul, which was much the stronger, elected him as Pope
(April 757), and the opposition broke up.!

On this election the reflections of Dr. Hodgkin may well
be quoted. “We have already, in the case of Silverius,
seen the son of a pope chosen for the papacy, though not
in immediate succession to his father. Now brother follows
close upon brother as wearer of the Roman mitre, almost
the only instance of the kind that has occurred in the long
annals of the papacy [Benedict VIII. and John XIX.—
1012-1033—were brothers]. The choice in this instance
seems to have been a good one, but it might have been
a dangerous precedent. Considering the immense power
which the popes have wielded, it must be considered on
the whole an evidence of statesmanship and courage on
the part of the electors that mere family claims have so
‘seldom determined the succession to the papal throne.”

To the candidate thus elected a most charming character Character,
is given by the contemporary author in the Book of the Popes.
Paul is there described as a man of exceptional kindness
and mercy. The testimony of ‘many’ is adduced to prove
that during the night he was in the habit of going about
among the abodes of the poor and the sick and adminis-
tering to them every comfort both for soul and body.
Still under the cover of night, that his right hand might
‘not know what his left was doing, he visited the various
‘prisons, and oft set free those who were under sentence
of death; and, by himself paying their debts, he redeemed
the poor debtors ‘from the yoke of slavery.’ Widows,
orphans, all who were in need of help, found in him a
strong and willing support. He was careful to prevent,
‘as far as he could, oppression on the part of his sub-

17. P. Some authors, relying on their ‘historic instinct, suppose
Theophylactus to have belonged to a Byzantine party, others to the
Lombard.

336 ST. PAUL I.

ordinates; and never did he render evil for evil. There
is, however, reason to believe that Paul was not always too
firm in checking at once acts of oppression perpetrated
by his subordinates. “If for a short time,” writes his
biographer, “any were oppressed (guemgquam tribulabat)
by his wicked satellites, it was not long before the Pope
in his compassion administered the balm of comfort
to the injured.” It is easy to see that this weakness of
the Pope must have earned him a certain amount of
unpopularity. No doubt he would never hear of many
who had been wronged, and many who have once been
maltreated are not soothed by subsequent kindness.

John, the Neapolitan deacon (Gest. Epp. Neap., c. 41),
has preserved for us a pleasing little anecdote of Pope
Paul, during the time when he was a deacon. A Nea-
politan deacon, of the same name as the Pope, who was
in the habit of often coming to Rome on public business,
formed a close friendship with the Roman deacon. On one
‘occasion when they were enjoying a chat, the Neapoli-
tan said, “God grant I may live to see you Pope.” “May I
see you Bishop of Naples,” was the prompt rejoinder, And
so it fell out. But, adds John, owing “to the detestable
image controversy which was at that time going on between
the apostolic authority and the abominable madness of .
Constantine Caballinus, nine months passed, and still the
Neapolitan Paul could not be consecrated. For the
Neapolitan people favoured the power of the Greeks,”
Thereupon the bishop elect betook himself secretly to
his friend, who was now Pope. He was at once con-
secrated by his old friend and sent back to Naples. “But,
on account of the Greek connection, his fellow-citizens
would not receive him,” although they recognised him
as their lawful bishop and allowed him to administer the
revenue of his See. They relegated him to the Church

ST. PAUL I. 337.

of St. Januarius, which was not far from the city. This
extraordinary state of things lasted nearly two years. At
length, however, the chief men of the city (primates),
perceiving that the people were yearning for their bishop,
with one accord installed him in his episcopal palace
within the city. He died 766 or 767.

Paul’s first act, as “deacon and in the name of God elect Notifies his
of the holy Apostolic See,’ was to address a letter! to See,
Pippin, “king of the Franks and patrician of the Romans,”
in which he informed that monarch of the death of his
brother and his own election by “the whole body of the
people.” With “the approval of our nobility, we have de-
cided to retain your envoy Immo, the letter went on, until
after our consecration. Then, with our own messengers, he
shall return to you .... our helper and defender. Mean-
while know that we are true to that fidelity, love and
treaty which our brother offered to and made with you, and,
with our people,we will ever remain in the same alliance.”

After his consecration, which took place on May 209, Writes to

: Constan-
757, inasmuch as he was “a stout defender of the tine in

F : : defence of
orthodox faith,” Paul commenced sending a series of the images

envoys and letters to the emperor, exhorting him in 757-7
strong terms to restore the sacred images.” But apparently

1 “A cuncta populorum caterva mea infelicitas electa est... . Una
cum nostris optimatibus . ... perspeximus .... quoniam nos... .
auxtliator et defensor rex, . . . . firmi et robusti in ea fide et dilectione
. atque pacis foedere, qua .... germanus meus .. . . pontifex,
vobiscum confirmavit, permanentes, et cum zostro populo permane-
bimus usque ad finem.” Cod. Carol., ep. 12, ap. Migne and G.
From the letters of Pope Paul it is abundantly manifest that the
Pope considers Rome Azs ;—its nobles and people were #zs. Pippin
was but his helper and defender.

27. P. Cf. Epp. 23 and 37 of Paul to Pippin in the C. C., ap.
Migne ; J. and G., 28, 36. ‘Sed in hoc vehementer isdem imperator
irascitur et occasionis versutiam adhibet, pro eo quod meguaguam
silesimus ei preedicandum ob constitutionem sanctarum imaginum et
fidei orthodoxe integritatem.” Ep. 36 G.

VOLS er tl, 22

Removes
the bodies
of thesaints
from the
catacombs.

338 ST, PAUL 1

all without any other effect than to increase the bitterness
of Constantine against the worshippers of images generally
—the Pope included. With the exception of a list of his
labours in the way of church restoration, this is practically
the last fact of Paul’s life that his biographer has recorded
of him. We must therefore turn to other sources. Before
entering on. his relations with Pippin, as made known to
us by the Codex Carolinus, a word or two on Paul's
building operations may not be unacceptable.

Finding that from age, and the vandalism of Goth
and Lombard, the catacombs were, many of them, falling
into decay, Paul with great ceremony conveyed thence to
the city, from the more ruinous among them, the bodies
of the saints, and placed them in the various churches.
Among the other catacombs to which Paul turned his
attention was the catacomb of SS. Nereus and Achilleus,
or of Domitilla, as it was sometimes called, on the Via
Ardeatina, about a mile from the Appian Gate (now
Porta S. Sebastiano). From this catacomb, in accordance
with the wishes of his deceased brother, and along with
the clergy and people of Rome, he transported (probably
October 8, 757) the body of St. Petronilla, believed to
have been the daughter of St, Peter, to the mausoleum
of Honorius on the Vatican hill, near St. Peter’s. This

circular structure.had already been made into a chapel

by Stephen III. in preparation for the reception of the
saint’s body. The honour of this foundation was assigned
by the Pope to Pippin! It came to be known as the
‘chapel of the kings of France.’

In the fourteenth century there was still in existence

1 Cf. the variant readings of the Liber Pont., and C. C., Ep. 13, ap.
Migne, 14 J. and G. Sigebert of Gemblours (Chvon.) refers this
translation to the year 758. On the occasion of repairs made to the
altar, the sarcophagus of St. Petronilla was discovered in 1474.

ST. PAUL «1. 330

a church which Paul built or rebuilt (fecé¢ moviter) in
honour of the apostles SS. Peter and Paul (760), “by the
Via Sacra, near the temple of Rome (or Romulus).”
There were there seen, by the author! of Paul’s life
the impressions said to have been made by St. Peter’s
knees on the stones where he knelt in prayer asking
God to humble the diabolical efforts which Simon Magus
was making to fly and thus to seduce the people. These
identical stones are now preserved in the neighbouring
Church of Sta. Francesca Romana (Sta. Maria Nuova).
As a last example of Paul’s work in this direction, we
will mention the fact that he built an oratory in St. Peter’s
in honour of Our Lady, and there placed a silver statue
of the Blessed Virgin, and made himself a sepulchre. In
imitation of St. Gregory I., and other popes, he turned
his paternal mansion into a monastery in honour of popes
Stephen I. (Martyr) and Silvester; and entirely rebuilt,
decorated and endowed the old church that stood by
it. This church, now known as ‘San Silvestro in Capite,’
is doubly interesting to us, as it was in it that St. Gregory
I. preached many of his homilies, and as it was given by
the present Pope (Leo XIII.) to the English Catholics.
Into the renovated church the Book of the Popes tells us
that Paul brought the remains of St. Silvester; and an
inscription, still to be read at the end of the nave, near
the Sanctuary, on the right hand side, after setting forth
that fact, adds that Clement VIII. in his turn, some eight
centuries later, renewed the church, and, finding the body
of the saint under the high altar, there left it. In his new
monastery Paul placed a number of Greek? monks, doubt-

1 Variant readings. “In quo loco usque hactenus eorum genua
pro testimonio . . . . in fortissimo silice esse noscuntur designata.”

27.P. Cf. the genuine bull of foundation, etc., ap. Archivio della
R. Socteta Rom., vol. xxii. (1899), p. 213 f.

Paul and
Eadbert,
King of
North-
umberland,

757+

England
and Rome
in the
eighth
century,

340 ST. PAUL I.

less some of those whom the violence of the Iconoclast
Constantine had driven into exile.

In the first year of his reign, Paul had occasion to
write to Eadbert, King of Northumberland. Though the
brother of Egbert, Archbishop of York, Eadbert did not
hesitate to give an early example of a style of conduct
that has found imitators in those who have since ruled
in this country. He rewarded his courtiers with property
that was not his to give—with monasteries. The result
was that an abbot Forthred appealed to Rome with regard
to three of such monasteries. Paul wrote? to the king, and
exhorted him as an obedient son and out of love for St.
Peter to restore the monasteries to their owner, the abbot
Forthred. From the fact that Eadbert resigned his crown
in this same year to end his days in the cloister, we may
fairly conclude that the Pope’s letter was successful in its
object.

Here it may be observed that it would be a great
mistake to judge of a pope’s relations with a country
from such few facts with which the actual name of an
individual pope is connected as have escaped the ravages of
time. So with regard to our own country, though the loss
of the papal registers has prevented us from getting to
know much of the personal relations of the different popes
of this century with England, we have records enough to

1 The ‘ first year, because the Azglo-Saxon Chron. (ad an. 757) gives
757 as the year in which Eadbert abdicated and retired into a monastery.

2 The Pope says the monasteries were given to “cuidam Patricio,
fratri ejus, ‘Moll’ nomine. . . . Quapropter hortamur solertiam
vestram, et per ap. sedem admonemus, ut sibi vere obedientes, ob
amorem protectoris vestri (S. Petri) praelato Forthredo abb., ipsa tria
monasteria restituatis.” In a note to this letter in the collection of
Haddan and Stubbs, iii. p. 395, it is stated that the monasteries were
probably those of Stonegrave and Coxwold in Yorkshire, and perhaps
Jarrow in Durham, From this Pope, Jaenbert received the pallium
as Archbishop of Canterbury. (Cf Florence of Worcester, ad an. 764.)

ST) PAUL 1. 341

let us see that they must have been very numerous. For
in the eighth century there was a perfect furore in England
for Rome and its bishops. Of this enthusiasm for Rome,
St. Boniface was not, as some imagine, the cause; he was
only an instance. The See of Rome was to our eighth
century countrymen ‘the glorious See.’ In Rome they
established a special quarter, called after their own
language the Sorgo (burgh). There, they declared, they
found ‘the rest of life’? they had long sought. Thither
they went for the forgiveness of their sins. There our
archbishops met the great churchmen of other lands and
formed friendships with them. Thither there journeyed
on pilgrimage—kings and “noble and simple, men and
women, soldiers and private persons, moved by the instinct
of divine love.”> Those who could not go yearned to go.®
So many, indeed, went that, as might have been expected,
not a few scandals arose in consequence. Many of those
who in this century set out for Rome were women—those
who had been consecrated to God (nuns) and those who
had not. And, of course, many of them had not properly
calculated the difficulties of the journey—its length, its
dangers, and its expense. Beautiful, but in want of
money and protection, many of them fell a prey to the

1 The abbess Bugga: “Primum, pontificem gloriose sedis ad desi-
derium mentis blandiendum inclinavit (Deus).” JZ. G. E®f., iii. 264.

2 “ Quod talem vitee quietem invenisset juxta limina S. Petri, qualem
longum tempus desiderando quesivit.” /0., 278.

3 “Desiderium habuimus, sicut A/urimz ex necessariis nostris et
cognatis sive alienis,.... Romam peteremus et ibi peccatorum
nostrorum veniam impetremus, sicut alii #u/tz fecerunt et adhuc
faciunt.” Jb., 263.

4 Bregowin, Archbishop of Canterbury, 759-765, writes to Lullus, the
successor of St. Boniface: “reminiscens, qualiter inter nos in civitate
Romana de amicitize conventione conloquium habuimus.” J@., 407.

5 Bede, De sex etat., an. 720; of. H. E., v. 7.

6 MW. G. Epp,, iii. 263, 278, 406, where the abbot of Wearmouth
speaks of my priest, “ Romam videre desiderantem.”

342 ST. PAUL L

Paul be-
comes god-
father to
Pippin’s
daughter.

passions of the foreigner. Hence St. Boniface, whilst
begging the ecclesiastical authorities in England to dis-
courage women from going on the Roman pilgrimage,
declared that there was scarce a city in Lombardy,
Frankland (Francia), or Gaul, where there were not
Englishwomen leading a notoriously bad life But this
ugly fact tells the story of the love of the English in
the eighth century for Rome and the popes even more
eloquently than the others which edify. So phenomenal
was this devotion of our race to the Apostolic See, that
in speaking of the English, a Frankish monk of this age
could find no more suitable description of them than to
call them the people “who were ever on the most friendly
terms with the Apostolic See.”? No wonder, then, that
an archbishop of Canterbury declared that with those
sacred doctrines with which the Roman and Apostolic See
was in accord, all his countrymen were in full harmony.®

Turning our attention now to the Caroline Codex, we
find that, in reply to the letter which the Pope sent him,
Pippin returned (757) a kind letter, asking Paul to stand
godfather to his daughter Gisela) The white garment
(sabanum) given to the little princess when baptised was
sent to the Pope. In acknowledging‘ (757 or 758) the

SW CRS Gh 10}

* “De gente Anglorum, qui maxime familiares Apostolic Sedis
semper existunt.” Gesta Abd. Fontanel., ap. M. G. SS,; ii. 280.

3 “ Quicumque illius (Bonifatii) sacree institutionis ac doctrinze nor-
mulam rite consequuntur, pro certo se sciant et ipsius Romanz atque
apostolice ecclesiz, a qua legatus eis directus est, ac deinde pariter
omnium nostrum habere . .. . perpetuam communionem.” Letter of

Cuthbert, Archbishop, of Canterbury, 740-762, ap. 12. G. EZp,, iii. 4oo.
Cf. the teaching of St. Aldhelm, sz, p. 85.

* Cod. C., ep. 13, ap. Migne, 14 G. In this letter Pippin is spoken ofas
“Ecclesie tutor.” “ Direxit quippe nobis insignis bonitas vestra, per suos
affatos, sibi innotescere adversantium causarum adventus.” In the year
759, in the beginning of which Pippin had a son of the same name, we find
(ep. 18 G.) Paul asking to be godfather to him as-he had been to Gisela,

ST. PAUL I. 343

receipt of this mark of Pippin’s goodwill, Paul did not
fail to point out that the Lombards had not manifested
any intention of completing the restoration of territory
which they had promised. For Pippin had requested the
Pope to keep him informed as to the course of events.
This letter Paul followed up (757 or 758) with another!
to the whole nation of the Franks, in which he thanked
them for what they had done for the Church, and hoped
that in return God would render them victorious over all
their enemies, to the great gain of the faith and the Church.
Very likely at the same time when he acknowledged the The

Roman

receipt of Paul’s letter, in which the Pope had notified his people
election to him, and at the same time asked him to be god- to pestis
father to his little daughter (who was born in 757), Pippin, ene
knowing their unsteadiness of character, addressed a letter

to the Roman people, in which he exhorted them to be

loyal to the Pope. To this the ‘whole senate’—ze., the
nobility—and people of Rome returned an answer After
thanking God for giving them in the Frankish monarch

such a ‘defender of His holy Church’; and declaring that

in accordance with Pippin’s letters they will ever remain
faithful to Blessed Peter, and to “our lord Paul, the chief
bishop and universal Pope, because he is our father and

good shepherd, and never ceases toiling for our welfare,

like his brother, Stephen of blessed memory,” they beg
Pippin, ‘ their defender after God,’ to continue to exert
himself for the exaltation of the faith and their protection.

And “by the living God, Who caused you, by the hands of

1 Ep. 14, Cod. C., 39 G.

2 Ep. 15 Mf; 13 G. “Nos quidem.... fideles servi S. D.
Ecclesize . . . . et domni nostri Pauli summi pontificis et universalis
papz consistimus, quia ipse noster est Pater... . fovens nos et
salubriter gubernans, etc. . . . Petentes et hoc coram Deo vivo, qui vos
in regem per suum ap. b. Petrum ungi preecepit, ut dilatationem hujus
provincize a vobis de manu gentium ereptz perficere jubeatis.”

Desiderius
takes the
field (758)
against the
Duke of
Spoleto,
etc.

344 ST UPAUL

His blessed apostle Peter, to be anointed king, we entreat
you to order the completion of the enlargement of this
province.” That is, they requested Pippin to see that the
whole of the exarchate was surrendered by the Lombards.
“The Romans! evidently recognised Paul as their ruler,
and the king as his defender.”

A last letter of this year (757)—if, indeed, it does not
belong to a later date—of the Pope to the Frankish king,
in reply to two received from him, is specially interesting,
as it is generally credited with containing the notice of the
first appointment, at the intercession of a prince, to what
was afterwards known as a cardinalate, viz., to the posses-
sion of one of the titular churches of Rome. And so we
find Paul? granting to the priest Marinus the title of St.
Chrysogonus,’ “with all the lands and property belonging
to it, whether in town or country.” Along with this letter,
the Pope sent Pippin, in addition to a ‘night-clock’ and
an antiphonary, the dialectics of Aristotle, the works of
St. Dionysius the Areopagite, and various other works by
different Greek authors.*

On the death of Aistulf, and during the disputed suc-
cession to the Lombard crown, the dukes of Spoleto and
Beneventum, who had been always striving for indepen-

1 Gregorovius, Rome, ii. p. 308. Mr. Bryce (Holy Roman Empire,
p- 64), however, asserts that Pippin had held the actual government
of Rome as patrician. Mr. Bryce’s great work would appear to be
sometimes too much dominated by theory.

Behe 1007, 24G.

3 One of the churches on the other side of the Tiber (in Trastevere),
It was afterwards the titular Church of our famous Cardinal Langton
from 1200 to 1220. Like too many other cardinals, appointed at the
prayer of those who have ruled in France, Marinus proved anything
but a cardinal (cardo, a hinge) to the Roman Church. He sided with
the Byzantines ; and though Paul was finally reconciled with him, he
at one time (Ep. 19 JZ.) had to request Pippin to have him consecrated

bishop and sent away from the court. Ep. 25 /. and G.
« “Omnes Greco eloquio scriptores.” Jd.

ST. PAUL 1 345

dence, placed themselves under the suzerainty of Pippin.
They were rightly convinced that the further away their
overlord was, the greater would be their practical in-
dependence. Gregorovius, indeed, states that “Stephen
had incited them to revolt against their lawful sovereign.”
But for this he adduces no proof. The letter! he cites in
connection with his assertion affirms the fact that the dukes
did place themselves ‘under the power’ of Pippin, but it
is quite silent as to any share the Pope had in their act.
Taking advantage, probably, of Pippin being at war?
with the Saxons, Desiderius resolved to bring back the
dukes to his own obedience. On his way south he laid
waste the Pentapolis, and was soon master of Spoleto and
Beneventum.? Alboin of Spoleto and his chief nobles,
“who had taken oaths of fidelity to St. Peter and to
you—quz in fide b. Petri et vestra sacramenta prebuerunt,’
were taken prisoners. But Liutprand, the Duke of
Beneventum, managed to escape to the ends of his
kingdom, and established himself in Otranto on the Ionian
Sea. Infuriated at the escape of Liutprand, Desiderius
nominated a new duke of Beneventum (Arichis), and
entered into communications with the Imperial envoy,
George, who was then at Naples, and endeavoured to
form a treaty with the emperor. He proposed that
Ravenna should be attacked by the combined Greek and
Lombard forces, and that, on its capture, the emperor was
to be free to work his will in every particular.* With
the aid of the emperor’s Sicilian squadron, Otranto was

1 Ep. 18 M@.; 17 G. Cf. Steph. (II.) III., ep. 11.

2 Cf. Hist. de France (Daniel, i. 377).

3 Ep.18; 17G. Cf. Camillus Peregrinus, ap. R. 7. S., ii, pt. i.

4 Ep. 18 4.; 17 G. from which all this is taken. “Suamque im-
perator . . . . adimplere valeat in quocumque voluerit voluntatem.” Cf.
ep. 15 G. Of this letter we have only asummary. It was already too
damaged to enable a verbatim copy to be made for the Caroline Code,

346 STSPAULIL

also to be besieged by the allied forces. Provided that
Liutprand was given up to Desiderius, the emperor might
have the city. When he had started this plan, the would-
be wily Lombard king made a peaceful visit to the Pope
to see if he could over-reach him. Before Desiderius
could well openly break with Pippin, it was most desirable
that he should get back the Lombard hostages still in the
hands of the Frankish monarch. Accordingly he promised
Paul that, if the hostages were sent back to hiin, he would
restore Imola, the ancient Forum Cornelii, and the other
places still in his hands. But the Pope was not to be
deceived in that matter. However, to blind Desiderius, he
despatched a letter! to Pippin (758), by Bishop George and
the priest Stephen, afterwards Stephen (III.) IV., in which
he asked him (Pippin) to restore the hostages and keep at
peace with the Lombards. However, Paul furnished his
envoys with another letter,? in which he unfolded to Pippin
the ravages of Desiderius, as well as his perjury in not
fulfilling his engagements. The Frank is warned not to
attach any importance to the first letter, which was simply
written that the Pope’s messengers might have something
to show that would save them from being detained by the
Lombards.? In conclusion, Paul begs Pippin to see to it
that Desiderius completes the promised restitution, and
sends him, as a present, a jewelled sword, a ring and cloak,
and rings for his sons Charles and Carlomann.

Tip. 17 47. ; 16 G.

2 Ep. 18 17.; 17 G. This simple diplomatic ruse of two letters
furnishes Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii. 311) with an opportunity for
taking a lofty stand. He thinks this action of the Pope would “ perplex
the judgment of austere Christians,” etc., etc. With some writers
the popes cannot.do right. If they turn the other cheek to the man who
strikes them on one, they are mean-spirited; if they exercise the
natural right of self-defence, they are wanting in Christian charity,

3 “Tstas litteras tali modo exaravimus, ut ipsi nostri missi ad vos
Franciam valerent transire.” Ep. 18 17.; 17 G,

ST. PAUL L 347

The result of the Pope’s appeal was an important Desiderius
embassy from Pippin to the Lombard king, consisting of someon
Remedius (or Remigius), brother of Pippin and Archbishop cenliortes
of Rouen, and Duke Auchar. They met Desiderius in. the Sean
“month of March (760 or 759), and he promised, before the ae
end of the following month, “to restore!-to the Pope all the
rightful claims (justitie) of Blessed Peter, to wit, all the
patrimonies, rights (7zra), localities, and territories of the
different cities belonging to the republic of the Romans.”
This promise Desiderius kept in part. But giving up
territory was to the Lombard like giving up his heart’s
blood, and his promise was not wholly fulfilled.2. However,
soon after this, more cordial relations began to spring up
between Desiderius and the Pope. For, as we shall see
presently, Paul had no difficulty in asking Pippin to
request the Lombards to aid him against the’Greeks. But
that time had not yet come. i

Pippin about this time became involved in a war with The

Greeks
Duke Waifar, or Waiffer, of Aquitaine? It may have been begin to
knowledge of that which emboldened Desiderius still to the new

power of

withhold the restitution he had so solemnly promised, and the popes,
which induced the emperor to begin to turn his attention rhe

to the affairs of Italy. It would seem that he made no
attempt to join in the alliance already proposed by the
Lombard king to the imperial envoy at Naples. Why,

we do not know. Perhaps on account of his difficulties

‘with the Bulgarians. With them he was at war, generally
successfully, from 753-775. Though he had sustained a

_-l Ep. 20. 4; 19 G. “Constitit ut .... omnes justitias — b. ;

Petri . . . . omnia videlicet patrimonia, jura etiam, et loca, atque fines

et territoria diversarum civitatum nostrarum reipublice Romanorum
: facie ae :

nobis plenissime restituisset.” Lb.

3 Cf. Hist. de France, Daniel, i.379. fC. C., epp. 23, 24 M. ; 27, 28
G. Pippin, indeed, was at war with Waifar, Duke of Aquitaine, from
760-768.

The
Lombards
again,

348 ST. PAULTE

severe defeat at their hands in the Balkans (759), he so far
recovered from its effects that he became free (761) to turn
his attention to the image question. He at once began a
fierce persecution of the image worshippers ; and, about the
same time, commenced to interest himself in Western
affairs. He intrigued in Rome, and gained over to his views,
as we have seen, the priest Marinus. He made lavish
promises to the Frank. He seems also to have intended
to accompany his words with a display of force. At any
rate, it appears to have been about this time that the Pope
wrote! to Pippin to tell him that “most trustworthy
subjects of your spiritual mother, our Holy Church, have
sent us word that six patricians, with three hundred ships,
and the Sicilian fleet have left Constantinople and are
sailing for Rome. With what object this is being done, we
know not. All we do know is that they are to call here
first and then proceed to your excellency in Frank-land
(Francia).” Paul had good reason to fear the diplomatic
wiles of the Greeks. Just before his death, Stephen (I1.)
III. had had to warn Pippin against them. Constantine’s
envoy, the Silentiary John, was at the Frankish court, and
Constantine’s presents were interesting all the Franks,
The Silentiary John was succeeded by the imperial
missus, George, whom we find? in Francia, in Naples, and
in communication with Desiderius. Paul had to repeat
(ep. 21) to Pippin the exhortation of Stephen against “the
impious arguments and empty promises” of the “enemies
of the orthodox faith.”

If, however, at this time the Greeks came not, Desiderius
did. Not only did he not keep his promises, made in

Tek pn 201.

2 Many of the annals mention an organ sent by Constantine.
“Venit organa in Franciam,” ann. Nazar. (757), etc, ap. 7. G. SS., i.

3 Epp. 15-17 G.

ST.IPAUL 1 340

presence of the envoys of the Pope and of Pippin, with regard
to coming to terms on the basis of a mutual concession
of claims, but he renewed his depredations in the papal
territories and despatched threatening letters to Paul him-
self1 Theravages the Pope complained of were committed
in the neighbourhood of ‘our city of’ Sinigaglia, and in the
Campagna.” Paul accordingly begged Pippin for help, and
asked him to send envoys both to Rome and Pavia (ep. 20).
Desiderius also sent to Pippin and calmly denied having
committed any acts of violence at all! The Frankish
monarch accordingly confined himself to promising aid
when it was required and to sending mzssz (ep. 21). These
envoys soon found out the truth.

Still help came not, only firm assurances from Pippin moe
that he would stand by the promises he had made to Pope «. 762.
Stephen (II.) III. to do all he could “for the defence of the
Holy Church of God, the Roman people, and the whole
province” (ep. 22). Paul therefore reminded him that
now was the day and now the hour when he should bring
speedy help to the Church and ‘this province by you set
free. + In his euphuistic style he wrote®: “ Accordingly
I beg and beseech you, my most excellent son and spiritual
fellow-father, and, by Almighty God and the body of Blessed
Peter, whose most faithful servant you are, I entreat you,
nay, with the most earnest supplications implore you, to

1 Ep. 20 G. “Et plures depraedationes ex tunc atque multa et in-
audita mala in nostris inmittit finibus. Unde ecce suas confestim
direxit litteras, per quas .... comminationes nobis direxit.” The
letters the Pope sent to Pippin.

2 “ Hostiliter quippe in civitate nostra Synogaliense pergentes, ferro et
igne, que extra eandem civitatem consistebant, devastaverunt. .. .
Similiter et in partes Campanie.... talia sicut pagane gentes
egerunt.” Ep. 21 G.

3 “Ft satisfacti sunt vestri missi de tantis iniquitatibus et cognoverunt
nostram veritatem et eorum mendacium.” J, Cf Ep. 22 G.

470. 5 Ep. 24° G.

Pippin’s

difficulties,

793.

350 ST. PAUL. 1

keep that carefully stored up in your holy, God-inspired
and mellifluous heart, which the most blessed lord Pope
Stephen, of holy memory, my brother, by divine inspiraHon,
admonished and besought you to accomplish.” i
But at this juncture Pippin could only help the Pope
by promises and by diplomacy. He was in the midst of
his struggle with Waifar of Aquitaine, and his cause had
been rendered wellnigh desperate by the sudden desertion
(763) ot the young Duke of Bavaria, Tassilo (III.) II.
(748-788). In the light of subsequent events, viz., the
duke’s marriage soon after this date with Liutperga, the
daughter of Desiderius, and his long alliance with his
father-in-law against the Frankish monarchs, there is
considerable likelihood in the supposition that this de-
fection was brought about by the machinations of
Desiderius himself. The consternation of the Pope can
be easily imagined. It manifested itself in a letter which
he wrote! to Pippin, begging him to let him know how
the war was progressing, as a long time had elapsed
since he had heard from him, and the enemies of both of
them were spreading alarming rumours. The combina-
tions of Desiderius, however, were destined not to succeed.
The Greek emperor, either because he mistrusted him; or
because, with the Bulgarian war and the persecution of
the image-worshippers, he had more than enough on. his
hands, had up to this shown no disposition to co-operate
with the grasping Lombard. And when, to the Pope’s
great joy,” Pippin extricated himself for the time from the.
Aquitaine campaign, Tassilo lost courage and repeatedly
begged the Pope to intercede for him with his out-
raged sovereign. To this request Paul acquiesced, and

Spe Taare 228 G.
3 Ep. 36 G. “Innotescimus christianitati vestree, quod jam sepius
nos petisse dinoscitur Tasilo Baiuariorum dux, ut nostros missos ad

ST. PAUL L Re

despatched two envoys, the priest Philip and his chamber-
lain Ursus, to negotiate a reconciliation between Pippin
and the Bavarian duke. That they should be reconciled,
however, did not coincide with the schemes of Desi-
derius. He detained the Pope’s envoys and would not
allow them to proceed beyond Pavia. Of this high-
handed conduct, Paul duly informed Pippin? But with
Waifar still unsubdued, the king of the Franks did not
feel prepared just then to take warlike action against the
Lombard. Although the day did come when the Franks
exacted retribution from both Desiderius and ‘Tassilo,
Pippin confined himself for the present to diplomatic
measures.

His envoys and those of the Pope were in communica- Greek
tion not only with Desiderius but with Constantine. Paul aaa
informs Pippin that owing to the severity of the winter
—numerous Frankish chroniclers? tell of the hard winter of
763-4—he has no word to give him in connection with
their ambassadors at Constantinople. These different
embassies were not all undertaken to no purpose. Some
kind. of an understanding, more or less amicable, must
have been arrived at about this time between Desiderius
and the Pope. For when at Rome fear of Greek inter-
ference became acute, we shall see Paul begging Pippin to
bid the Lombards help him if any attempt were made from
Constantinople on Italy. And so when at last there
arrived in Rome a messenger from some of the Pope’s

vestram preeclaram excellentiam dirigi annuissemus, ut ea inter vos
provenirent, quze pacis sunt.”

DE pasorGs

2764. “ Hiemps grandis et dura.” Aznal. Alaman.,etc. Numerous
details of its effects in the East in Theophanes, Chrom., an. 755.
It must be remembered that his ‘years of Christ’ are eight years short
of the true date.

3 Epp. 28 and 29 G.

383 St. PAUL 1.

officials (fideles) in Ravenna, “who were wont to supply
him with reliable intelligence,’! to report that “the most
unspeakable Greeks, enemies of God’s Holy Church and
foes of the orthodox faith, were forming plans for a descent
upon Rome and Ravenna,” Paul in three letters? begged
Pippin to induce the Lombards, their dukes as well as
their king, to hold themselves in readiness to help him
against any hostile movement of the Greeks, and to send
him a missus who might take up his residence in Rome
and so be ever ready to summon aid. “For as your
excellency knows right well, it is for no other reason that
we are annoyed by the Greeks than because we hold to the
holy and orthodox faith and the tradition of the fathers,
which they are eager to destroy.”* On this occasion there
seems to have been general alarm all along the coast of
the Adriatic. The Venetians, the Archbishop of Ravenna,
the maritime cities of the Pentapolis, all were in anxious
expectation.+*

Frankish envoys were accordingly despatched to Italy.
As usual at this time, the embassy was composed of both
clerics and laymen. It consisted of two abbots, Widmar
of St. Riquier and Gerbert, and a wir znlustris, Hugbald.
They had to assure the Pope that their master would exert
himself for the exaltation of the Church and the orthodox
faith, and would stand by the promises he had made to
Pope Stephen. They had also to try and adjust matters

1“ Qui vera nobis semper adsolent indicare.” Ep. 30 G.

2 30-32 G. “Petimuste ....ut.... confestim vestrum digne-
mini dirigere Desiderio missum, ut, si necessitas fuerit, significatum
auxilium nobis pro incursione eorundem inimicorum impertire debeat,
precipiens Beneventanis atque Spoletinis seu Tuscanis nobis e vicino
consistentibus, ut ipsi nostro occurrant solatio,” ep. 30 G.

8 Ib. 4 Ep. 31 G.

534 G. “Qui (the mzssz) apud Langobardorum regem inminerent

regem pro diversis S. Dei Ecclesize causis ac justitiis et in nostro
assisterent solacio.” 0,

SR PAUL TT. 353

between the Lombards and the Pope, and to be a comfort
to the Pope.

The missi had no difficulty in arranging the prelimi-
naries of peace. In presence of the Pope they met the
envoys of the Lombards, and from the Pentapolis and ‘the
rest of our cities, and a mutual restoration of plunder
was agreed upon. No territory was, however, restored by
the Lombards; hence, in relating! these transactions to
Pippin, Paul urged him to insist on the full restitution
of both territories and patrimonies “in accordance with
the terms of the treaty.” For, as he very sensibly pointed
out, if the Lombards were not made to give up every-
thing. to which they had no right, they would soon
strive to recover what they had already (760) sur-
rendered.?

Free to try and adjust the differences between the Pope
and Desiderius were the Frankish envoys. They had not
to trouble themselves about armaments from the East.
Constantine had enough to do at home. A terrible storm
in the Euxine wrecked the whole of a transport fleet
destined for the Bulgarian war. The greater part of 3000
ships and their crews were lost (766). He had also to deal
in the same year with a real or pretended conspiracy, one
result of which was the cruel torture and execution of the
patriarch of Constantinople (Constantine), whose Icono-
clastic beliefs were thought by the emperor to be on the
wane.2 Copronymus had no other alternative but to fall

BED 3 biG.

2“ Asnoscat christianitas vestra, quia, si nobis preelati civitatum
nostrarum ab eisdem Langobardis invasi fines atque patrimonia
reddita non fuerint, etiam ea, que primitus reddiderunt, invadere
insidiabunt.” Jd.

3 Theoph., ad ann. 757 and 759. On this treatment of the patriarch,
Hodgkin (/¢aly, vii. 252) remarks : “This depth of degradation, into
which imperial tyranny had hurled the second patriarch of Christendom,

is probably the best justification that can be offered for the Roman
VOL, LPT. IL 23

Greek
envoys in
Francia,
766 (?).

354 ST, PAUL I

back upon diplomacy. He accordingly sent envoys to
Pippin, in the hope of winning him over to his Iconoclastic
views. Ifhe could make Pippin a heretic, the cause of the
Pope was lost.

The imperial envoys, Authi, a Spatharius, or one of the
emperor's personal bodyguard, and Sinesius, a eunuch, were
bearers of both letters! and verbal instructions for Pippin.
They were, if possible, to shake his orthodoxy, his devotion
to the Holy See, or both. To gain time, or to conceal their
master’s real views, they were to pretend that the Western
envoys, notably Christopher, the papal primicerius and
consiliarius, had not made their reports to the emperor in
accordance with the instructions they had received.2 But
Pippin was not to be easily gained over to either the
political or religious ideas of Constantine. He was
convinced that it was politically advantageous for him to
side with the Pope against the Greek and the Lombard,
and he was steadfast in his adherence to the Catholic faith.
For the Pope had taken care to keep him informed of
the belief of the Catholic world on the ‘image question.’
About this time the patriarchs of Jerusalem (Theodore),
Antioch (Theodore), and Alexandria (Cosmas) anathema-
tised Cosmas, Bishop of Epiphania in Syria, because he
had gone over to the emperor’s heresy*; and “Theodore
of Jerusalem, in a synodal letter to the patriarchs of

pontiffs eagerness to obtain the position of sovereignty, which, as he
might think, could alone secure him from a similar downfall.”

1 “Simulationis ac inlusionis causa” (ep. 36 G.), Paul says they were
written.

2“ Adseruit (imperator) quod... . Christophorus .... sine
nostra auctoritate . . . . suggestiones illas, quas sepius ei direximus,
fecisset, et alias pro aliis ejus ac vestris missis relegisset.” Baseless is
the assertion, declares the Pope ; and he easily scores a point against
the Greeks, “in id quod nec suis nec vestris ac nostris credant missis.”
(6.)

8 Theoph., Chrom., A.C. 755.

Si PAU I 355

Antioch and Alexandria, undertook the defence of images;
and they, after signing it, sent it to Rome (to Pope Paul) as
their confession of faith in this matter.”! A letter of this
Cosmas of Alexandria to the Pope was by him duly for-
warded to Pippin, “that you may learn what is addressed to
-us concerning the integrity of the faith by the Oriental
‘prelates and the rest of the nations.” The synodal letter?
just alluded to, which was also signed by ‘very many
_ Oriental metropolitans, reached Rome after Paul’s death,
but was forwarded to Pippin by the antipope Constantine.
Pippin, then, had no difficulty in knowing what was the
faith of the Catholic world on the ‘image question.’ With
‘regard to the political situation, he once again assured the
Pope that no specious arguments or promises would ever
-induce him to be false to the engagements he had entered
into with Pope Stephen.* He further informed the Pope
that he had sent Authi, along with mzssz of his own, back
to Constantinople, but was detaining Sinesius till an
assembly of his bishops and nobles might be held, to
discuss the religious questions raised.°
In the early part of the year 767 there was held at the Sree,

-royal villa of Gentilly, near Paris, where Pippin spent a 77-
great deal of his time, a synod of Frankish bishops. It is
the general belief that this was the gathering which Pippin
informed the Pope that he intended to bring together. All

1 Neale, Patriarchate of Alexandria, ii. p. 128.

2 Eps 4o1G.

8 Cf ep. 99, Cod. C., ed. G.; 45 ed. /.

4 “Per eadem vestra scripta significantes, quod nulla suasionum
blandimenta vel promissionum copia vos possit avellere ab... . fidei
promissione, quam b. Petro... . et ejus vicario.... Stephano,
polliciti estis.” Ep. 36 G. Cf ep. 37.

5 Epp. 36 and 37. “Significans (excellentize vestre christianitas)

. eos (Greecos) aput vos esse detentos, interim quod, aggregatis
vestris sacerdotibus atque obtimatibus, conicere . . . . valeatis, quid
de his, quze vobis directa sunt, respondendum sit.” Ep. 37 G.

Final deal-
ings with
the Lom-
bards.

~356 ST. PAUL I.

we know of this diet is, that there were discussed at it the
doctrines of the Blessed Trinity and sacred images.t With
regard to the former subject, there can be little doubt
that it was ‘the Procession of the Holy Ghost’ which was
discussed. It may be that the Greeks brought up this
abstruse question to cover the little they had to say on
such a clear point of Catholic doctrine as the image
question.2 Whether any good resulted from this ‘great
synod’ is not known. Paul himself does not speak of it.
He died (in June) not many months after it was held.
As far as the chronological uncertainty attending the
order of Paul’s letter will enable us to speak, it seems that
the tension between the Lombards and the Pope continued
to decrease with his declining years. And so, in a letter
which may belong to the close of the last complete year
(766) of Paul’s reign, and which has just been quoted
(ep. 37 G.), we find Paul writing: “Your excellency made
known to us that you had directed Desiderius to restore
to us our runaway slave Saxulus. But your excellency
should know, nay, we believe does know, that last autumn
Desiderius himself came ‘ad apostolorum limina’ to pray,
and brought the slave with him and handed him over to
us. Moreover, after a discussion with him on the question
of settlement of claims, it was agreed that missi of both
of us should go through the different cities and there
arrange all differences. By the mercy of God things have
been settled in the Beneventum and the Tuscan territories.
In the duchy of Spoleto some matters are settled, and every
effort is being made to bring the rest to a conclusion. In

1 “Ffabuit D. Pippinus . . . . synodum magnum inter Romanos et
Greecos de S. Trinitate vel de SS. imaginibus.” Azmnal. Lauriss., ad
an. 767.

2 The faith of the Frankish bishops on the image question was
manifested by them at the Lateran Council of 769. Cf. infra, p. 372.

Sr. PAUL TE 357

a postscript your excellency informed us that you had
instructed Desiderius to bring pressure upon the people of
Naples and Gaeta to restore to your protector, Blessed
Peter, the Neapolitan patrimonies, and to allow their
bishops-elect to come to this apostolic See for consecration
asusual. For this and all else we return your excellency
most hearty thanks.”

At all this Pippin manifested his pleasure, and ex-
pressed a hope that the Pope “would endeavour to
remain at peace with the Lombard king.” “Ii that sost
excellent man,’ replied the Pope, “will stand by the pro-
mises he has made to your excellency and to the Roman
Church, we will remain in peace with him.”! So friendly
had the Pope and Desiderius become, that, in this same
letter, Paul tells the Frankish monarch that he has agreed
to go with the Lombard king to Ravenna, that together
they may devise means of protection against the Greeks,
who are daily threatening a descent on that city. It
would appear that Paul died in the peace which his
skilful diplomacy had brought about with that most
excellent man Desiderius, king of the Lombards.

Though most of Paul’s letters to the Franks and their Various
rulers were taken up with the ‘Lombards or the Greeks, end bip

between
it must not be concluded that every part and all of them the Pope
were so. In two? of them we see first the Pope giving Pepin,
the monastery of St. Silvester on Mount Soracte, where
Carlomann had lived as a monk, to Pippin, and then
Pippin giving it back to the Pope. Another? letter
shows us the Frankish clergy eager to become perfect
in the Roman chant; and the Pope entrusting a number
of Frankish monks to the head of his school of cantors
to be thoroughly trained in church music. It was still in
Rome that the arts of civilisation were preserved. In

1 Ep. 38 G, * Epp. 23, 42 G. & Ep?4r G;

The letters
of Paul.

358 ST. PAUL I.

return for the various presents which Paul made to
Pippin, the latter sent the Pope an altar. This Paul
had erected! in the ‘confession’ of St. Peter; and after
he had consecrated it, he offered Mass on it for Pippin’s
spiritual and temporal welfare. Finally, another letter?
gives us a glimpse of the work of the Pope for the
interests of others besides his own, a branch of Paul’s
work which the poverty of historical material that has
come down to us enables some historians to call in
question. We refer to the letter (ep. 36) which treats
of the efforts made by Paul to bring about the reconcilia-
tion between Pippin and Tassilo of Bavaria, of which
we have already spoken.

Here we must confess we are not sorry to leave the
letters of Paul. Their monotony, with their opening of
thanks to Pippin and their closing with prayers for his
welfare, is anything but cheerful. It was doubtless as
necessary for Paul to write them as it was for Ovid to
write his ‘letters from Pontus.’ The effect on the reader
is the same in both cases. Melancholy he can scarcely
escape from. To their sameness, as one source of weari-
ness in the student, must be added, as another such source,
the uncertainty as to their year of issue. The student has
only the grim satisfaction of feeling that his presentation
of the events of Paul’s reign may be all wrong !?

1 Ep. 21 G. “Quam (mensam) et chrismate unctionis santificantes,
et sacram oblationem super eam imponentes, sacrificium laudis Deo
omuipotenti, pro zterna animee vestree remuneratione et regni vestri
stabilitate offeruimus.”

2 Ep. 36 G.

8 Jaffé has assigned, in many instances, quite different dates to some
of the letters to those given by Cenni. Not to mention those dates
which differ only by a year, or those cases in which, for a definite year
assigned to a letter by Cenni, Jaffé only indicates the period of years
during which the letter was written, we find Jaffé relegating to 763 or 4
letters (epp. 23 and 24 of Cenni) which Cenni gives to 760; to 765 or 6,

Sr. PAUL. I. 359

However, before taking our final leave of the letters of Their

Paul I., it will be useful to listen to what they have to say
in general as to the character of their writer and his
relations to Pippin. They may indeed weary the reader
from their verbosity and sameness, but they certainly
impress him with the conviction that Paul’s presentation of
his case is the true one. They show him constantly!
sending to Pippin the documents which he has received
from Desiderius and others, constantly ? asking him to send
his missi to examine into matters in dispute on the spot,
and constantly reminding him that his envoys have
convinced themselves that the truth is with the Pope, the
falsehood with the Lombard.? They make it obvious
that the Pope is the real ruler of the duchy of Rome, of
Ravenna and of the Pentapolis. zs are the cities zs
are the nobles and the people’ They, on the other hand,
proclaim themselves his subjects (servz).6 Pippin, on the
contrary, in every variety of phrase, is spoken of as the
Pope’s helper, protector, and guardian.’ He after God is
Paul’s ‘security, under his protection is the Pope’s ‘ pro-
vince,” ® which must not be withdrawn ‘from his (Paul’s)
power and jurisdiction.’® The letters of Paul exhibit him

ep. 28, assigned by Cenni to 761; to 767, Cenni’s ep. 34 of 763; to
760, Cenni’s ep. 38 of 764; to 761, Cenni’s ep. 39 of 765; to 761-2,
Cenni’s ep. 42 of 767. In some cases Jaffé’s date is certainly correct,
as in the case of ep. 34. Gundlach’s dates, again, differ from those of

Jaffe.
1 Cf, ¢.2., Epp. 20, 29, 31 G. 2 Epp. 20, 36 G.
3 Bppa2t, 22 G. 4 Ep. 34 G.
5 Epp. 12, 29 G. 8 Ep. 13 G.

7 Auxiliator, defensor, Epp. 12, 13 ; tutor, 14; liberator, 16; pro-
tector, 20; propugnator, 25 G.
8“ Nostra est securitas,” ep. 13 G. “Jubeat vestra excellentia

ut.... hec provintia.... redempta et a vobis b. Petro....
concessa ab emulorum insidiis vestra consueta permaneat protectione,”
ep. 30 G.

9 Ep. 37 G.

lessons,

Death of
Pope Paul,
June 28,
767.

360 ST. PAUL 1

not only as pursuing a straightforward policy in a truthful
way, but as possessed of a forgiving character. He pleads
for Tassilo, who, as the foe of Pippin, was his enemy also;
and, at the prayers of a blind mother, he punzshes the
traitor Marinus by getting him made a bishop.1 Finally,
they prove that the ‘Kiersey treaty, by which both the
Pope and Pippin? expressed their determination to stand,
was to be set for the ruin and the resurrection of many!

To avoid the great heat of the summer in Rome, Paul
had retired to St. Paul’s outside the walls. He was,
however, stricken down there with a mortal sickness; and
though, when others abandoned him, probably in fear on
account of the stormy events to be related in the life of
Stephen (III.) IV., he was as carefully nursed by his
successor Stephen as he himself (Paul) had attended his
brother,? he died June 28, 767.

Here for three months was left the body of Paul. At
the end of that period, however, “all the Roman citizens
and the other nations,” who lived in special quarters in
Rome, and were spoken of as ‘schole,’ transported the
said body by water to St. Peter’s, whilst singing the
Psalms for the dead. The. body was then placed in the
oratory, in which Paul had himself prepared his tomb.*
Over his sepulchre were written the simple words: “ Hic
requiescit Paulus Papa.” In the Roman martyrology he
is honoured as a saint on June 28.

1 Epp.25,29 G. 2 Epp. 12, 36 G.

8 Cf. L. P. in vit., and also in vit. Steph. IV. Cf also a fragment of
the Acts of the Lateran Council of 769, ap. Cenni, Coc. Lat. and
Lee inAso,

47. P. Gregorovius (Rome, ii. p. 320) concludes from “the
tumultuous scenes amid which his latest hours were spent ’—(but which
were not caused by the Romans, but were introduced from wzthout)—
that Paul, “as temporal ruler of the city,” “was by no means popular.”
The respect paid to his body is enough to prove the opposite. The delay
in the paying of it was caused by the troubles that ensued on his death,

vy Teale 2) Bo Sg A Os ad Ba A
A.D. 768-772.

Sources.—A comparatively full, detailed and contemporary life in
the Z. P. Two letters of the antipope Constantine and five of
Stephen in the Caroline Codex. A few other letters of the Pope
on the affairs of Italy, etc., in different authors. The acts of the
Lateran Council (769), fragments of which have been published
by Cenni (Conc. Lat., ann. 769, Rome, 1735—a very rare work),
and then by Mansi, Conc., xii. Other fragments have been since
discovered by Wasserschleben. ‘The most important portion of
Cenni’s fragment has been printed by Duchesne (Z. P., i. 480-1),
who has also published what has been preserved to us of the
report of the ambassador (Creontius) of Tassilo of Bavaria on the
fall of Christopher and Sergius. Like Stephen’s biographer, the
ambassador shows himself favourably disposed to Christopher.
The actual words of the so-called Creontius, the Secretary of
Tassilo III. (748-788), are no longer in existence. But the
substance of his narrative was incorporated into his Axaales
Boiorum by Adventinus, ze, John Turmair, a writer of the
sixteenth century. The Chronicles.

Modern Works.—On the careers of Christopher and Sergius, read
Mem. ed. Apologie intorno ai Som. Pont., by L. Tripepi, p. 321 seg.

EMPEROR OF THE KING OF THE KINGS OF THE
EAST. LOMBARDS. FRANKS.
Constantine V., Desiderius, 756-774. Pippin, the Short,
Copronymus, 741-775. 752-768,

Charlemagne and
Carlomann, 768-771.
Charlemagne; 771-800,

Election
of an
antipope,
June 28,
767.

362 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

THE election of Pope Stephen IV. was unfortunately
preceded by a series of disorders that had a very tragic
termination. These disturbances were brought about by
the ambition of a man, who was, as it seems, one of the
papal governors. Very desirous that the great spiritual
and now considerable temporal power also of the papacy
should be wielded by one of his own family, he would not
even wait for the death of Paul to begin his nefarious
designs. Accordingly this aspiring noble, Toto, duke or
governor of Nepi, began to plot against the life of Paul.
His schemes were for a time frustrated by the watchfulness
of Christopher, the primicerius of the notaries, who brought
together into his house Toto and other notables, and made
them swear! that the new Pope should only be chosen by
common consent and from the Roman clergy, and that
none of the country-people should be introduced into the
city. Toto, however, had no intention of allowing himself
to be fettered by an oath. He retired to Nepi, and, with
the aid of his brothers, Constantine, Passivus, and Paschal,
collected troops from Nepi and other parts of Tuscany,
as well as a crowd of armed peasants. Before Paul had
breathed his last, this armed band broke into the city by
the gate of St. Pancratius. On the death of Paul, Chris-
topher, in his deposition before the Lateran Council, said
that all at once assembled in the “ Basilica of the Apostles,”
and that before they parted he had made all swear that
they would respect one another’s rights. No sooner, how-
ever, had the meeting broken up than Toto’s adherents
assembled at his town residence and elected Constantine,

1 “Sacramentum mutuo prebuimus quod nullus, extra alium,
electionem egisset, sed eum quem ex suo consilio divina providentia
tribuisset, ex corpore S. nostrze ecclesize, videlicet de sacerdotibus vel
diaconibus . . . . nobis eligeremus antistitem.” (From the declaration
of Christopher before the Council of 769.)

STEPHEN (III) IV. 363

though yet a layman, Pope. At the point of the sword,
the antipope was introduced into the Lateran Palace

Next an attempt was made to force George, Bishop of Rapid _
Preeneste, to give the tonsure to Constantine. This at first of hee
George refused to do, but threw himself at the feet of the tense
usurper and adjured him by all that was sacred to give up
his impious attempt and not be the cause of such a wicked
novelty being introduced into the Church.2, But the con- ;
spirators very soon gave the poor bishop to understand that
he must do their behests or take the consequences. In fear,
therefore, George performed the ceremony of giving the
tonsure, and Constantine was a cleric. The next day,
Monday, the same bishop had to make the antipope a
subdeacon and a deacon, quite, of course, against? the
canons, which require an interval between the giving of the
major orders of at leasta day. The people were then forced.
to take an oath of fidelity to Constantine, who, again by the
persuasive action of the sword, was consecrated bishop:
(July 5, 767) by George, Eustratius of Albano and Citonatus
of Porto, and contrived to hold the See for over a year.

One of the antipope’s first acts was to write to Pippin, Writes to
with a view of securing that prince’s adhesion to his elec- se ad
tion. He boldly declared* to the Frankish king that,

1 With the Z. P. compare the fuller account in the Acts of the
Lateran Synod in Duchesne.

27, P. “Corruensque in terram prostravit se pedibus ipsius
Constantini,” etc.

3 7%, “Contra sanctorum canonum instituta.” The Z. P., in vit.
Steph. IV., relates that a few days after Constantine’s consecration,
George was struck with paralysis, and, unable to raise his hand to his
mouth, soon died.

4 Cod. Carol. ep. 98 G. “Urbis vel subjacentium ei civitatum
populus meam infelicitatem sibimet przesse pastorem elegerunt.”
As Duchesne takes note, Constantine does not seem to have been
aware that the fact of the people of the neighbouring cities having
taken part in his election constituted a serious zrregularity.

Faith

of the
Oriental
patriarchs
on the
subject of
the holy
imagese

304 STEPHEN (III) IV.

contrary to his wishes and merits, the people of “Rome,
and of the cities adjoining it,” had raised him to the high
dignity of successor of the apostles, and begs for a con-
tinuation of the friendship which Pippin had shown to
Stephen III. and to Paul. In answer to his request, he
sends Pippin such of the Lives of the Saints as he could
find. The request had, of course, been made during the
lifetime of Paul.

Of this letter Pippin, who had doubtless been more or less
correctly apprised of the true state of affairs from other
sources, took not the slightest notice. Accordingly Con-
stantine sent him another letter, in which he again affirmed
that the united action of the multitude had forced him to
accept the heavy burden of taking charge of the Lord's
‘rational sheep.’ Then, after hypocritically introducing a
considerable number of Scripture texts, he earnestly begs
Pippin for his friendship, promises that ‘he and his people’
will cherish the Franks and their king even more than his
predecessors have done, and so begs Pippin not to put any
faith in what may be said against him.

Of special interest in this artful document is the para-
graph in which the antipope tells Pippin that he is sending
him a copy in Greek and in Latin of a letter, which, on
the 12th of August, he had received from the East. This
letter, addressed to Pope Paul, Constantine describes as a
‘synodical letter of faith’ (synodtca fide) sent by Theodore,
patriarch of Jerusalem, and endorsed by the patriarchs of
Antioch (Theodore) and Alexandria (Cosmas), and a con-
siderable number of Oriental metropolitans. Constantine,
after reading it publicly to the people, sent a copy of it to

1 This second letter was despatched after August 767. ‘Testis nobis
Deus .... ut plus etiam quam... . pradecessores pontifices in
vestra....regni Francorum charitate....cum omni ~wzostro
populo firma constantia erimus permansuri.” Jé., ep. 45 /.; 99 G,

STEPHEN (III) Iv. 365

Pippin, “that he might see,” he said, “what zeal there was
in the cause of the holy images! throughout the whole
Christian East.”

There was at this time, and there had been for some time
previously, considerable activity in that part of the East
not under the sway of Constantine V., in behalf of the
holy images. Pope Paul had received a profession of
faith on that subject from Cosmas,’ patriarch of Alexandria,
who there restored the Catholic succession, This profession
Paul had sent* to Pippin, “that he might know the letters
which the Pope received in connection with what was
being done for the integrity of the faith by the Oriental
bishops and by the other nations.” Unfortunately
Charlemagne, when he caused the collection of papal
letters, which bears his name, to be drawn up, did not
order the letters which accompanied them to be included
in the collection. Hence these letters, of such importance
for showing the true faith of the Eastern Church on the
image question at this time, have perished. The bishops
under Moslem rule were free from the tyranny of the
Byzantine emperor. Hence their letters and synods * show
that their faith on the subject of ‘images’ was as that of
the Pope and the West. Owing, however, to the obscurity
which envelops the history of the Oriental patriarchate
at this period, it is quite impossible to state with any
certainty the occasion of the drawing up of the letters

1 “Ut agnoscatis qualis fervor sanctarum imaginum orientalibus in
partibus cunctis Christianis inminet.’ Jd.

2 Cf. Neale’s Pair. of Alex., il. pp. 108, 128, ete.

3 Ep. 40 G. With these letters of Cosmas and of Theodore of
Jerusalem and the rest, compare the synodical letter of Theodore of
Jerusalem, read in the third session of the Seventh General Council.
(Cf. Héfélé, Councils, Eng. trans., v. §§ 340 and 345.)

4 Cf notices of synods held by each of the above-named three
patriarchs, ap. Theoph., Cvom., ad an. 755. Vid. sup., p. 354-

Chris-
topher

and h’s son
leave
Rome.

Sergius
enters
Rome
witha
Lombard
army.

366 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

sent to Pope Paul first by Cosmas, and then by the
united East.

Retribution for his violence and deceit was all this while
being prepared for Constantine. Christopher, the primi-
cerius of the notaries, and his son Sergius, treasurer of the
Church, had, at the outset of the antipope’s usurpation,
made some show of resistance. Finding, however, that
their lives were in danger, they soon gave it up and fled for
their safety to St. Peter’s. When the first violence of the
outbreak had passed away, the two officials, “who preferred!
to die rather than witness the success of such impious
presumption” on the part of the antipope, came to a secret
understanding with others within the city of a like mind
to themselves. They then feigned a great desire to enter
a monastery, and begged Constantine, with the greatest
humility, to allow them to leave the city and become monks
in the monastery of Our Saviour, near Rieti, in the duchy
of Spoleto. Exacting an oath from them that such was
their intention in leaving the city, Constantine gave them
the required permission. Once outside the city (after April
10, 768), the two thought no more of their oath, but went
straight to Theodicius, Duke of Spoleto, and begged him
to take them to his sovereign,? Desiderius. In answer to
their prayers that he would bring to a close the scandal
which was afflicting the Church, Desiderius gave orders
that they should receive the support of the Lombards. © In
conjunction with a Lombard priest, Waldipert, Sergius
marched on Rome with a force of Lombards from the
duchy of Spoleto. Admitted into the city by his friends
at the gate of St. Pancratius (July 30, 768), Sergius and

1 Pand Cone. Lat.

2, P, in vit. Steph. IV. “Adjurantes .../ ut eos . ”. . ad “Desi-
derium swam deduceret Regem Longobardorum.” Had Theodicius
returned to the allegiance of the Lombard king?

STEPHEN (III) Iv. 367

his party seized the walls, but were, or pretended to be,
afraid to descend the Janiculum.

As soon as he heard of the entry of the Lombards, Toto
hastened to meet them, along with Demetrius, the
secundicerius, and Gratiosus, the chartular, afterwards
duke, who were secretly in league with Sergius. Seeing
Toto strike down one Rachipert, the most formidable of
their number, the Lombards would have fled, had not Toto
himself fallen, pierced through by Demetrius and Gratiosus,
On the death of the daring Toto, his brother Passivus fled
to warn Constantine to fly ere it was too late. The two
brothers rushed from one part of the Lateran to another,
and finally shut themselves up in the oratory of St.
Cesarius. Here, after some hours, they were discovered.
Dragged thence, they were thrown into prison by the
officers of the Roman army.!

Matters now took an unexpected turn. Unknown to A secona
Sergius, and doubtless with the intention of getting a Pope pee
favourable to his master, Waldipert collected a number of
Romans (alquantos Romanos), went to the monastery of
St. Vitus on the Esquiline, took thence a priest named
Philip, declared that St. Peter had chosen him Pope, and
conducted him (July 31, Sunday) to the Lateran basilica.
Here, after the prescribed prayers had been said by a
bishop, Philip proceeded to hold the customary banquet in
the Lateran palace, at which assisted a certain number of
the dignitaries? of the Church and State. But, like

1“ Romanz militiz judices.” All this direct from the Z. P.

2“ Primates ecclesice, et optimates militie”—still the Z. P. The
whole of this passage is very interesting as showing the order of events
after the election of a Pope and his introduction to the Lateran palace
‘more solito.’? “TIllicque oratione ab Episcopo data juxta antiquitatis
morem, tribuensque pacem omnibus, in Lateranense introduxerunt
Patriarchio. Et ibidem similiter in Pontificalem sellam sedens, tribu-
ensque denuo, ut mos est, pacem, ascendit sursum et mensam, ut
assolent pontifices, tenuit.’

Election
of Stephen,
Aug. 768,

- 368 _ STEPHEN (III) IV.

Baltazzar, Philip was condemned whilst at the feast. Chris-
topher had meanwhile arrived before the city gates, and,
hearing of the election of Philip (so far irregular that he was
not one of the cardinal priests or deacons from whom the
popes were wont at this time to be chosen), declared on
oath to all the Romans who had gone out to meet him
that he would not enter the city till Philip was driven from
the palace. Philip did not require much driving. He
quietly returned to his own monastery.

The first care of Christopher was to bring about a lawful
election. Accordingly he summoned (August 1, 768) not
only the chief men among the clergy and the army, but
everybody, “from the greatest to the smallest.” They met
together in front of the Church of St. Adriano, a spot called,
by the Book of the Popes, ‘in tribus Fatis, from statues
of the three Fates which stood near. It was that part of
the Forum known as the ‘Comitium, where of old the
‘Comitia Curiata’ held their deliberations. On this historic
ground the Romans unanimously resolved to elect Stephen.
Going to his church of Sta. Cecilia in Trastevere, they
escorted him with every demonstration of joy to the
Lateran as Pope-elect! Thus closed one of the first of
those struggles between the ecclesiastical and secular
nobility of the new papal state, which were destined to
last so long and to bring at times, through the too fre-
quent triumph of the secular nobility, especially in the
tenth century, so much disgrace on the Papacy and the
Church. As the troubles caused the Papacy at this period
by its external foes—Greeks and Lombards—were decreas-
ing, those caused by its enemies at home were destined to

17, P. This designation (in tr. Fatis) of the north corner of the
Roman Forum is very ancient. Pliny (H. JV., xxiv. 11) speaks of three
statues of the Sibyls near the Rostrum, and St. Cyprian (ep. 21) uses
the appellation itself (Duchesne, Z. P., i. 481).

STEPHEN (III.) Iv. 369

increase. The latter evil was, however, the lesser. The
foes at home only aimed at seizing the papal dignity;
those abroad aimed not merely at the persons of the
popes, but, the Greeks at least, at their principles.
The man thus elected was a Sicilian and the son of Character
: 4 : : and early
Olivus; and, according to his biographer at least, was a career of
man of strong character, well versed in Scripture and ee
ecclesiastical tradition, and a doer of good works, When
he came to Rome from Sicily, Pope Gregory III. placed him
in his monastery of St. Chrysogonus, where he became
a cleric and a Benedictine monk. As he was only a child
(garvulus) under Gregory, he must have been born about
the year 720. Hence when he became Pope he must have
been about fifty. He was taken from the monastery by
Pope Zachary, who ordained him priest, and, charmed
with his modesty, kept him in his immediate service in
the Lateran. For the same reason he also found favour
with Zachary’s successors; and, as was noted above, he
remained by the bedside of the dying Pope Paul when all
others through fear had left him.
During the interval between Stephen’s election and Savage

‘ ‘i r cruelties
consecration, there were perpetrated a series of revolting practised

deeds of cruelty. The cause of this outbreak of wild ees
revenge is hard to trace. The history of Rome in the seg
Middle Ages has not, up to this time, as far at least as we
know it from the sources at our disposal, revealed any such
traces of lawlessness as would have prepared us to expect
the scenes of blood we have now, to portray. We may,
therefore, presume that they are evidence either that
the unceasing conflicts with the Lombards had caused a
gradual decline of morality in the city, or that they were
the results of civil strife, rendered more sanguinary than
usual from some more or less accidental cause. Civil
strife is ever waged more cruelly than any other.- And if
VOLs tsp y. IT. 24

370 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

one side gives the slightest exhibition of extra cruelty,
then such passions are set ablaze that no act of barbarity
seems too diabolical for either side to think out and to put
into execution. We shall give the account of these out-
rages practically in the very words of Stephen’s biographer,
so that the reader may judge how far he may unreservedly
accept the conclusion of Gregorovius+ that Stephen ‘did
not seek to prevent’ these horrors, meaning, thereby, we
take it, that he connived at them.

Whilst that most holy man (Stephen) was still but
Pope-elect, says the papal biographer, there was gathered
together a band of men who had before their eyes neither
the fear of God nor His terrible judgment, in obedience to
the orders of certain wicked wretches, whom God’s just
retribution has overtaken.2 The gang began by seizing
Bishop Theodore, Constantine’s vicedominus, and depriving
him of his eyes and tongue. Passivus was also deprived of
his eyes. The houses of both the unfortunate men were
plundered, and Theodore, thrust ‘into the monastery of
Clivus Scaurus’—the monastery, it would seem, that was
founded by St. Gregory I. on the site of his paternal house
—was left to die of hunger and thirst.2 The antipope
Constantine was driven through the city in mockery on
horseback, seated on a woman’s saddle, with heavy weights
attached to his feet, and then lodged in a monastery near
the Church of Sta. Sabaon the Aventine. This church, from
the fact of its being, along with the monastery adjoining,

1 Rome, etc., ii. 329.

2 This contrast between Stephen and the ‘aliquanti perversi’ is
quite enough to show that to the mind at least of the Pope’s biographer,
Stephen had no direct or indirect connection with the atrocities his
biographer goes on to enumerate. It may here be observed that
‘aliquanti Romani’ were always to be had throughout the whole of
the Middle Ages for any purpose whatsoever.

3 “Clamansque aquam!” ZL, P.

STEPHEN (III.) Iv. 371

the first asylum of the Greek (Basilian) monks in Rome,
was known as ‘ad Cellam zovam.1 Thence he was taken
(August 6) to the Lateran basilica, and canonically de-
graded.2. His pallium was cast at his feet by a sub-
deacon, and his shoes, the special ones worn by a Pope,
cut off.

The next day Stephen was consecrated in St. Peter's ; Consecra-

° BI t
and by the mouth of Leontius, one of the papal secretaries, Stephen,

the people confessed their guilt for not resisting the anti- She a
pope.

Unfortunately the consecration of Stephen did not put Further
an end to the violence that was being perpetrated in the eae
name of justice. One of the towns of the Campagna, which
one of the MS? of the Liver Pontificalis sets down as
Alatri, a mountain town not far from Anagni, and which its
ancient lords, the Hernicians, boasted to have been built
by Saturn, held out for the antipope Constantine. Its
governor, the ‘tribune’ Gracilis, as he is described in the
Book of the Popes—a title which, like ‘consul, was at
this period a momen sine re—relying on the natural and
artificial strength of his position, considered he was safe
in defying the new power, and commenced to ravage the
Campagna. He was mistaken, however. His strong-
hold was stormed by a force of Romans,* Tuscans, and
troops from various parts of the Campagna, and he himself
taken prisoner to Rome. From his prison he was ruth-
lessly dragged by certain “wicked Campanians, .... who

1 Hence the Z. P., “in monasterio Cellanovas .... deportatus est.”

2 Jb. “Lectisque sacratissimis Canonibus ita depositus est ; accedens
enim .... subdiaconus orarium de ejus collo abstulit et ante pedes
ejus projecit.”

3 Cf. Muratori’s ed. of Z. P., ap. R. / S., and Duchesne’s.

4 “ Ageregati universi exercitus Romane civitatis, et Tusciz et
Campaniz .... constringentes fortiter ... . civitatem, ipsum exinde
abstulerunt Gracilem.” Z. P.

The
Lateran
Council,
769.

(372 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

were urged on by some most impious men more wicked
than themselves,”! and deprived of his eyes and tongue.

A few days after, these same strangers, with the approval
of the chartular Gratiosus? and his chief officers, “by whose
authority these terrible deeds were done,’ dragged the
unfortunate Constantine from his monastic prison, early
in the morning, put out his eyes, and left him lying in the
street.

Finally, on a charge of conspiring to kill the primicerius,
Christopher and other nobles, and to hand over the city to
the Lombards, orders were issued to arrest the Lombard
priest Waldipert. The poor priest fled to the Church of
Our Lady ad Martyres, or the Pantheon. Thence, still
clinging to Our Lady’s image, Waldipert was drawn, and so
cruelly was the usual brutal werk of blinding performed
that he soon died.*

While gladly finishing with these deeds of blood, we
would observe that the only one whom history in any way
connects with them, as a responsible agent, is the chartular
Gratiosus. Stephen is represented as merely passive.

In the very outset of his pontificate, Stephen had sent to in-
form Pippin and his two sons, Charlemagne and Carlomann,
of his election. He begged them to send to Rome bishops
learned in the Scriptures and in canon law to assist at a synod
which would take steps to prevent the repetition of such
a usurpation of the Holy See as had just been perpetrated.t
On their arrival in France, the papal envoys found that the
great king Pippin was no more. He had died September
24, 768, and Charlemagne and Carlomann were reigning in

a LP.

2 “Tuscani et Campani... . inito consilio cum Gratioso et
fortioribus ejus, per quorum auctoritatem tanta mala operabantur,
perrexerunt,” etc. Z. P. Does this passage imply that Gratiosus

was responsible for all these atrocious doings ?

8 7b. trp:

STEPHEN (III.) IV. 373

his stead. The two kings gladly complied with Stephen’s
wishes, and twelve of their bishops set out for Rome.

In April (769) the Pope opened a synod in the Lateran
basilica of some fifty bishops, and a considerable number
of the inferior clergy and of the laity. The first work to
which the council turned its attention was that of ex-
amining into the doings of the antipope. The blind
Constantine was introduced, and was asked how he had
ventured, being a layman, to intrude himself into the
Apostolic See and be guilty of such an unheard-of impiety.
In reply, Constantine urged that he had acted under com-
pulsion, inasmuch as the people hoped thus for a remedy
from the evils that Pope Paul had brought upon them.
Then he threw himself on the ground, confessed that he
had sinned, and begged the synod to forgive him. At the
second day’s examination, however, Constantine was by no
means so submissive, but argued that he had done nothing
new. This barefaced attempt to defend his usurpation was
more than the assembly could endure. They?!ordered him
to be beaten and cast forth from the Church. Then the
acts of the antipope were publicly burnt before the whole
synod, and the Pope and the bishops, along with the
Roman laity, prostrated themselves, sang the ‘Kyrie
eleison’ and declared that they had sinned in receiving
Holy Communion at the hands of Constantine. After the
imposition of a suitable penance, and after a careful dis-
cussion on the canons, it was decreed, under pain of

1 “Trati zelo ecclesiasticee traditionis universi sacerdotes alapis ejus
cervicem czedere facientes eum extra ecclesiam ejecerunt.” ZL. P. Of
course Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii. 330) and Milman (//zs¢. Laz, etc.,
iii. 33) do not hesitate to affirm that it was the clergy themselves that
struck Constantine. But there can be no doubt that ‘caedere facientes’
means ‘to cause to be struck.’ Hence one reading has ‘cedi’ (LZ. P.,
i. 475); Gf ‘interficere facientes’ of this very council, ap. Duchesne,
Ua Vee Se LASEN

374 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

interdict, that no layman could be made Pope, and that
only cardinal deacons or priests, who had passed through
the minor orders, were to be eligible for the honour of the
papacy The laity, moreover, were forbidden any share in
the election for the future ;? express prohibition being urged
against the presence of armed men, and of the troops from
Tuscany and the Campagna. But when the election had
been held by the clergy, the Roman army and people were
to salute the elect before he was escorted to the Lateran
Palace.

Decrees were next passed with regard to the ordinations
held by the antipope. It was decided that the bishops,
priests, and deacons whom he had ordained were to again
rank only from the degree from which the antipope had
raised them. However, if those who had been consecrated
bishops were re-elected in the ordinary canonical way, they
might be reconciled and restored ® to the episcopal grade by
the Pope. In the same way he might reinstate the priests
and deacons. But such laymen as had been ordained
priests or deacons by Constantine had to do penance in
the religious habit all their lives, and none of those whom
the antipope had ordained-were ever to be promoted to a
higher grade. These stringent regulations were made
with the very desirable object of preventing the recurrence

1 “Ne ullus preesumat laicorum, neque ex alio ordine, nisi per dis-
tinctos gradus ascendens, diaconus aut presbyter cardinalis factus fuerit,
ad sacrum Pontificatus honorem possit promoveri.” Z. P. In this
passage we meet with the word ‘cardinal’ for the first time in the
Lae:

2 “Sed a certis sacerdotibus atque proceribus ecclesiz et cuncto
clero ipsa pontificalis electio proveniat” (Conc. Lat.).

° Not veconsecrated in the ordinary sense. Hence the L. P. says
that such re-elected prelates “ demedictionts susciperent consecrationem.”
From Auxilius (De ordin., i. c. 4, ap. Migne, t. 129, p. 1080) it would
perhaps appear, however, that they were actually reconsecrated ; but
the state of the case is obscure.

STEPHEN (III.) IV. 375

“of such? impious novelties in the Church of God.” The
bishops who had been consecrated by Constantine seem
to have been all reconciled by the Pope. But Stephen
would never re-establish the priests or deacons in the rank
to which the antipope had raised them. Furthermore, in
general, the sacraments which Constantine had adminis-
tered, except baptism and confirmation (sanctum chrisma),
were to be repeated.

Finally, after a careful examination of various testimonies
of the Fathers, it was decreed that holy images? had to
be venerated by all Christians; and the late synod of
Constantinople (754) against the sacred images was
anathematized.$

When the business of the council was over, a great pro-
cession of the clergy and people, all barefooted, was made
to St. Peter’s. There the decrees of the council were
solemnly announced to all, as well as the anathemas to
which any who dared to violate them were exposed.* It
‘ was the wholesale disregard of the decrees of this council
in the matter of papal elections that some two centuries
later reduced the Papacy to its lowest level.

The example of, violent interference with canonical Usurpation

: . atRavenna,
election offered in the case of Stephen was not long in 77,

1 “ Ne talis impius novitatis error in Ecclesia Dei pullularet.” Z. P.

2 “Statuerunt magno honoris affectu ab omnibus Christianis ipsas
sacras venerari imagines.” 0.

3 On the decrees of this synod, cf The Lateran Council, ap.
Mansi, xii; Jaffé, Regesta, ad an. 769; L. P. in vit.; and Héfélé,
Conc., Eng. trans., v. § 343. By way of a practical protest against
Iconoclasm, Stephen, like the other popes of this period, increased the
number of holy images in the churches, erecting special places for
their accommodation. “ Fecit enim et tres regulares super rugas .
ubi imagines in frontispicio constitute sunt.” Z. P. Ducange is not
certain as to the exact meaning of ‘regulares’ and ‘ruge.’ It would
seem that the erections were screens, like our rood-screens, with
hanging curtains,

#070 Pe

376 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

being followed. On the death of Sergius, Archbishop of
Ravenna (770), the archdeacon Leo was duly elected to
succeed him. But Michael, a lay secretary + of the Church,
procuring the connivance of Desiderius, the Lombard king,
who was, of course, not averse to promoting trouble in the
Pope’s dominions, and the armed assistance of Maurice,
Duke of Rimini, got himself elected by force. Leo was
safely imprisoned by Maurice in his ducal city; and the
two conspirators, with the, probably enforced, co-operation
of the ‘judges’ (judices) of Ravenna, at once sent to offer
the Pope large sums of money if he would consecrate
Michael. This Stephen refused to do on any account, and
sent both letters and envoys to induce Michael to with-
draw. For atime, a year and more, the usurper was able
to set the Pope at defiance—the ornaments of the cathedral
and the episcopal palace supplying him with the means of
buying the support of Desiderius. But at length Stephen,
taking advantage of the presence in Rome of one of
Charlemagne’s envoys, Hucbald, sent him to Ravenna along
with his own legates. Emboldened by the appearance of
the Frankish ambassador, the party of law and order
took courage, rose, sent Michael in chains to Rome, and
reasserted the rights of Leo. Accompanied by a large
number of his clergy, Leo at once went to Rome, where he
was consecrated bishop by the Pope.?
Charle- The short pontificate of Stephen IV. brought him many
aera serious troubles from first one quarter and then another.
7°97 Whilst the difficulties at Ravenna were still unsettled,
Stephen was filled with fear lest the mortal enemies of the
popes, the Lombards, might gain a solid advantage over
him from a new line of policy suddenly developed by
*Z.P. “Scrinarius ... . qui nullo sacerdotali fungebatur honore.”

? With the account in the 7. P., compare the confirmatory evidence in
one of Pope Hadrian’s letters. (Cod. C., 88 /.; 85 G.)

STEPHEN (IIL) Iv. 372

Desiderius. This affair, which touches on Charlemagne’s
wives! is involved in no little obscurity for that very
reason, as well as from the ever-recurring difficulty of
the want of dates to the letters in the Caroline Code.
To writers with theories, of course, nothing presents a
difficulty. From our ignorance of many crucial facts and
dates, the reigns of many of the popes simply present to
the writer a mass of facts, like so many pieces of coloured
marbles, out of which each man can make a mosaic for
himself according to his own design. We will endeavour
to give the facts of the case so that the reader may judge
of their bearings for himself.

Pippin, as we have said, was succeeded by his sons,
Charles (Charlemagne) and Carlomann. If we can rely
upon Andrew of Bergamo, who wrote a century after this,
the elder brother, Carlomann, was a man of savage temper.*
At any rate, whatever the cause, there was no love lost

1 With regard to Charlemagne’s wives, it is certain that he had a con-
siderable number, apparently nine ; and it seems that he had a number
of concubines, though it has been maintained (see, ¢.g., Revue Cath.,
1868, p. 497 seg., Louvain) that the latter were simply morganatic wives.
And though the history of these wives cannot be said to be strictly
ascertained, it does not seem that they were all his lawfully from a
Christian point of view ; that is, on the understanding that divorce and
bigamy are unlawful. Perhaps, to judge from the laxity of certain
canons of the councils of Verberie (753) and Compiégne (757) in the
matter of the marriage laws, Charlemagne may have thought that
the laws of the Church allowed him to divorce his wives in certain
cases. Some moderns say that Desiderata is also sometimes called
Bertha. A writer in the Avg. Ast. Rev. (Jan. 1900) suggests that
Bertha, the name given to her by Creontius and Andrew of Bergamo,
was probably assumed on her marriage, as a Latin name would not be
thought fit fora Frankish queen. This but adds another to the already
very numerous, Zossibly well-founded, conjectures which have been
devised in connection with this whole affair. As a matter of fact, it is
not certain what was the name of the daughter of Desiderius ; the best
authorities only speak of her as ‘ the daughter of Desiderius.’

2 Hist, c.3 (ap. MZ. G. SS. Langod.), Carol. “ferebundus et pessimus.’

The
brothers,

Frankisn
embassy to
Desiderius,
770.

378 STEPHEN (III.) Iv.

between the brothers ; and the tension between them, while
it brought the greatest anxiety to their mother and to the
Pope, would, of course, be viewed with complacency by
Desiderius. By the efforts of those, the Pope among them,
who wished the brothers well, some measure of harmony
was established between them, perhapsin 769. In a letter?
to ‘Charles. and Carlomann, kings of the Franks and
patricians of the Romans,” in which Stephen expressed
his pleasure at the good news which they had sent him
regarding their reconciliation, and their firm intention to
stand by the promises which, with their father, they had
made to the vicars of St. Peter, he begged them to fulfil
their engagements, to see to the full restoration of the
justitie of St. Peter, and not to believe any story to the
effect that he had already received them.

Accordingly, in prompt compliance with Stephen’s re-
quest, an embassy was despatched by the Frankish kings
to put pressure upon the Lombard monarch Desiderius.
One of the envoys was Ittherius, Charlemagne’s chancellor,
and apparently with them went Bertrada (Bertha), his
mother.? That the mzss¢ were at least partially successful
in their errand is certain; not only from contemporary
chronicles, but from a letter of the Pope to Bertrada and
her son, in which he commends to them the exertions of
Ittherius in obtaining the restitution of the Beneventan
patrimony. ?

But the envoys, and the queen-mother particularly, had

1 Cod. C., ep. 44 G., belonging to 769 or 770. “Exigere a Lango-

bardis jubeatis .... ut sua propria isdem princeps App. atque S.
Romana rei publice ecclesia recipiat.”
2 Ann. Moissiac.,an. 770. “ Berta... . in Italia ad placitum contra

Desiderium regem; et redditze sunt civitates plurime ad partem

S. Petri, et Berta adduxit filiam Desiderii in Franciam.” Cf. ‘Ann.

Petav., an. 770, also ap. M@. G. SS., i.; and Ann. Mosellani, ap. tb., xvi.
3 Ep. 46 G., an. 770 or 771,

STEPHEN (JII.) Iv. 379

another end in view besides furthering the cause of peace
between Desiderius and the Pope. She went to Italy,
indeed, “for the sake of peace,”! but she went also “on
account of the daughter of King Desiderius.”? Her réle
in this matter of the ‘daughter of King Desiderius’ has, we
believe, been much exaggerated by some modern authors,
She has been represented as its prime mover, and as acting
from the highest political motives. That she was not its
prime mover would seem to be proved by the letter of
Pope Stephen, soon to be quoted. This letter must be
regarded as the most important authority on this matter
"_the more so that there is nothing to oppose to its state-
ments. However, when “she had finished the business for
which she came to Italy, and paid her devotions at the
shrines of the Apostles at Rome, she returned to her
sons in Gaul.”? Let us hear what the business ‘of the
daughter of King Desiderius’ was.

Perhaps in the year 769, at any rate early in 770,
Desiderius proposed that his daughter should marry one
or other of the Frank kings,‘ doubtless with the view of
attaching them to himself and alienating them from the
Pope. Tassilo of Bavaria was already his son-in-law. He
would do well if he could make one of the Frankish kings
another. It appears to have been also proposed to give
the little Gisela to Adelchis, the son of Desiderius.

When Stephen heard of this proposal, he was naturally
alarmed and shocked, for both the young kings were already
married.> He at once, therefore, wrote to them. After

1 4nn. Lauris., et Ann. Einhard, ann. 770. “ Pacis causa.”

2 Ann. Petav., 4c: 3 Ann. Laur. and Ezih., Lc.

4 Ep. Steph., ap. Cod. C., 45 G. “ Desiderius vestram persuadere
dignoscitur excellentiam, suam filiam uni ex vestra fraternitate in
conuvio opulari,” ed. /. 47.

5 From passages soon to be quoted from this letter (ep. 45 G.), there
cannot be the slightest doubt that Charlemagne, as well as Carlomann,

380 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

warning them that they must be on their guard, because
the devil is ever on the watch to get the better of us by
assailing us on our weak side, just as he ruined Adam
through the feebler nature of a woman, he proceeds to say
that noble Franks ought not to dream of uniting themselves
with Lombards, who are such a loathsome people, as the
fact of the lepers originating from them shows.1_ If that is
the case with the nation of the Franks in general, how
much less ought you two kings to unite with Lombards,
“you who are already, by the will of God and the com-
mands of your father, lawfully married to noble wives of
your own nation, whom you are bound to cherish.2 And cer-
tainly it isnot lawful for you to put away the wives you have
and marry others, or ally yourselves in marriage with a
foreign people, a thing never done by any of your ancestors.
... It is wicked of you even to entertain the thought of
marrying again when you are already married. You ought
not to act thus, who profess to follow the law of God, and
punish others to prevent men acting in this unlawful
manner. Such things do the heathen. But they ought
not to be done by you who are Christians, ‘a holy people
and a kingly priesthood.’” Stephen then uses other
arguments. He reminds the two young kings that their
father Pippin, at the exhortation of Pope Stephen, his pre-

was at this time really married, whatever conclusions some are inclined
to draw from Eginhard to the contrary.

1 That there were lepers among the Lombards, the laws of Rothari
(e.g., 176), by legislating for them, prove. And when we reflect that
lepers are still to be found among the Scandinavian peoples, it may
easily be that the Lombard barbarians brought, at least, a great increase
of lepers into Italy. Writers who are so ready to blame the strong
language of this letter forget how despicable the Lombards really were—
the worst and lowest of the barbaric invaders of the empire.

2 “Jam Dei voluntate et consilio, conjugio legitimo, ex preeceptione
genitoris vestri copulati estis, accipientes, de eadem vestra patria... .
pulcherrimas conjuges, et eorum vos oportet amori esse adnexos.”
Cod. C., ep. 45 G.

STEPHEN (III.) Iv. 381

decessor, refrained from putting away their mother; that
they had promised the same Pope that they would ever
count his friends and enemies theirs also; and that their
father, at the wish of the Pope, refused to give his daughter
Gisela even to the son of the emperor Constantine, and
had with them promised obedience and love to the Pope.
In conclusion he exhorts them by the living God and His
dreadful judgment, and by the body of St. Peter, not to wed
the daughter of Desiderius, nor “to dare to put away their
wives,”! and not to give their sister Gisela to the son of
Desiderius ; but, on the contrary, mindful of what they had
promised to St. Peter, to resist the Lombards and force
them to fulfil the promises they had made to restore the
rights of the Church. For so far from keeping their word,
the Lombards never cease to oppress the Church. “This
letter, after having placed it on the Confession of St.
Peter, and celebrated the holy sacrifice over it, we are
sending to you with tears. But know that if anyone,
which God forbid, should contravene this letter, he is
excommunicated and given over to eternal flames with
the devil and the wicked.”?

For some cause or other the proposal of the Lombard
king recommended itself to the queen-mother, Bertrada
(Bertha). In the course of the year 770,? as we have seen,

1 “ Nec vestras quoquo modo conjuges audeatis dimittere ” (2d.).

2 7, Some authors, more anxious to fasten on certain phrases in this
letter which sound somewhat coarse or harsh to modern ears, but which
the rougher minds of the men of those days, as well as the occasion,
may well excuse, if not justify, fail altogether to present to their readers
a true idea of the Pope’s letter. (Cf Gregorovius, Rome, etc., ii. 338 5
Hist. of Charlemagne, by G. P. R. James. The language of the latter
(p. 130) is simply ridiculous in its exaggeration.) The formula of
anathema with which this letter concludes is the one in general use at
this period, and is, indeed, much the same as that used at present.

3 Cf. Chron. Motssiac., 700, ap. M. G. SS.,i.; Annal. Fuldenses,

etc.

382 STEPHEN (III) Iv.

she came to Italy to escort Desiderata to France. The
young kings Charlemagne and Carlomann were, we have
already noted, anything but perfectly united, and had it
not been for the forbearance of Charlemagne, there would
have been war between them. Bertrada may have argued
that if their thoughts could be turned ‘to marriage and
giving in marriage,’ war between them would be averted.
Or perhaps her object may have been to get an ally for
Charlemagne (to whom she seems to have been more
attached) in the event of war between the two brothers,
just as it was doubtless the object of Desiderius to attach
to himself one of the brothers—he did not mind which—
and then foment trouble between them and weaken both
of them. To say the least of it, these conjectures are
perhaps as likely to be true as the many others put for-
ward in this connection. And though she failed to induce
Gisela to marry the son of Desiderius, or Carlomann to
marry his daughter, she succeeded in persuading}
Charlemagne to marry Desideratas When exactly the
' marriage took place we do not know. At any rate, in less
than a year Charlemagne divorced her, for some cause
unknown even to Eginhard, and to the great chagrin of
his mother? If Andrew of Bergamo could be safely quoted
as an authority on this point, what has been said of Bertha’s
wish to secure an ally for Charlemagne would receive no
little support. He avers (c. 3) that it was Carlomann who
forced his brother to repudiate Desiderata! Withal, it is
as likely as not that the remonstrances of the Pope
prevailed in the end.
The down- Probably whilst Charlemagne was still united with
Chaisto-, Desiderata, Stephen had another and more serious
pher an

ea aon 1 Eginhard zz vit. Car.,c. 18, Eng. trans., p.65. Az. Fuld.,an.770.

or 771). “ Berhta filiam Desiderii, Karolo conjugio sociandam de Italia adduxit.”
2 Jb., pp. 66-7. Cf. Vit. Adalthard, c. 7, ap. AZ. G. SS., ii.

STEPHEN (IIL) Iv. 333

difficulty to face, and a difficulty that is to us now more
involved in obscurities than the marriage question of
Charlemagne. To begin with, we will narrate the affair
as it appears in the contemporary author in the Lzder
Pontificalis, noting how far his story is supported by the
words of the Bavarian envoy, the secretary of Tassilo III.,
the so-called Creontius or Crantz.

Christopher and his son Sergius, who had been the
prime movers in Stephen’s elevation to the popedom,
continued to be his right-hand, men after his consecration.
By their advice every effort was made through Charle-
magne and Carlomann to force Desiderius to surrender
various rights (justzti@) belonging to the Holy See in
different parts of Italy over which the Lombard had
control, and which he had repeatedly promised to restore.
Christopher was certainly a masterful man. So boldly did
he fulfil his mission to Constantine, that the emperor ex-
pressed his belief that the envoy must have exceeded his
commission ; and we have seen how, in the election of
Stephen, he thwarted the designs, first of the rough noble
Toto and then of the Lombard Waldipert. Convinced,
then, that Sergius and his father were his ablest opponents,
and inflamed with anger? against them, Desiderius resolved
to destroy them. He accordingly managed to buy the
tongues of the Pope’s chamberlain, Paul Afiarta, and
others, and directed them to be used in blackening the
characters of Christopher and Sergius before the Pope?
Then he gave out that he intended to go to Rome to
offer up prayers to St. Peter. But Sergius and his father

17. P. “Unde nimia furoris indignatione contra preenominatos,”
etc. Cf Creontius, ap. Duchesne, Z. P., i, 484. “Desiderius....
Christophorum Romanum, prudentissimum virum .... dolo capturus.”

2“Dirigens clam munera Paulo... . simulavit (Desiderius) se
quasi orationis causa . . .. Romam properaturum.” 16.

384 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

were not easily deceived. They straightway collected
troops, closed the gates of the city, and made all the
necessary preparations for resistance. When Desiderius
and his army arrived before the city, he sent to the
Pope to request an interview. To this Stephen agreed,
and after a conference on the justitig, returned to the
city. In his absence Paul Afiarta and his party had
endeavoured to raise the people against Christopher
and his son. But these leaders were ready and attacked
their opponents, who seemed to have fled to the Lateran
palace. Thither the victorious party pursued them,
following them even into the Pope’s presence in the
basilica of Pope Theodore. It was apparently at this
juncture that, according to the Bavarian, the Pope was
forced “to take an oath to be true to Christopher and
Sergius, as they suspected him of having come to an
understanding with the enemy.” They knew Desiderius’
hatred of them, and they feared that in his interview
with the Pope he might have put pressure upon him
to give them up. To resume from the biographer of
Stephen. Indignant at this violation of his rights and
person, Stephen soundly rated the attacking party and
ordered them to withdraw, an order which they immedi-
ately obeyed. The next day the Pope again went out
to St. Peter’s, which was at this time outside the walls
of the city, to have another conference with the false
Lombard. Creontius speaks of this as a flight (/fug7?),
and goes on to say that the Pope and the king again
conspired against Christopher, endeavoured by threats,

1 The more easily to make headway with the Pope, Desiderius
promised that he would give the Pope complete satisfaction in this
matter. Needless to say, Stephen had to complain of his faithless-
ness! “Stephanus de fraudulenta ejus (Desiderii) fide referuit, inquiens

quod omnia illi mentitus fuisset qua ei... . promisit pro justitiis.”
L. P. in vit. Hadriani.

STEPHEN (IIL) IV. 385

money and every means to turn the people against
him, and threatened to destroy the city unless he were
given up.

Following the Liber Pontificalis, Stephen left the city
to continue the discussion on the ‘claims’ of St. Peter;
but Desiderius would not again discuss the question of
the usurped ‘rights’! (justiti@) of the Holy See, but
only what he was pleased to call the treachery of
Christopher and Sergius towards the Pope. It would
then appear that, failing to make any impression on the
Pope with words, in violation of all the sacred rights
of ambassadors, he had recourse to violence. For the
papal biographer goes on to relate that Desiderius
imprisoned the Pope and his suite in St. Peter’s by
closing all the gates, and that ¢hex the Pope sent two
bishops to parley with Christopher and Sergius, and to
tell them that they must either retire to a monastery
or come out to him at St. Peter’s. According to the
Bavarian, the bishops cried: “Pope Stephen bids you not
to fight against your brethren, but to expel Christopher
from the city, and save it, yourselves, and your children.”
He adds that Christopher was at once given up in chains.
It may be noted, in passing, that the testimony of
‘Creontius’ cannot be said to be of the same value as that
of the Book of the Popes, as it is impossible to tell from the
work of Aventinus precisely how much is from the pen
of the sixteenth century German and how much from
the eighth. This message, clearly, as it seems to us,?

1 “ Przetermittens Desiderius causas de justitiis b. Petri tantummodo
pro deceptione Christ. et Sergii insistebat. Unde claudens universas
januas b. Petri, neminem Romanorum, qui cum ipso s. Pontifice
exierant, ex eadem ecclesia egredi permisit. Tunc direxit ipse
almificus,” etc. LZ. P.

2 The account of this affair in Gregorovius (Rome, etc., ii. p. 334)
is very largely supplemented from the author’s imagination. By

VOL t-PT it 28

386 STEPHEN (III) IV.

dictated by Desiderius, naturally caused distrust to arise
among the adherents of Christopher and Sergius. Their
followers rapidly fell away from them, and, though at
first they were loath to leave the city, first son and then
father betook themselves to the Pope during the night.
Next day the Pope returned, or was allowed to return,
to the city, leaving, doubtless because he had no choice
in the matter, Christopher and Sergius in St. Peter’s, but
hoping! to be able to find some means of bringing them
back to Rome by night. From the Bavarian narrative
we learn that during this eventful day the superiors of
the monasteries near St. Peter’s, who went thither to
try to obtain mercy for Christopher and his son, were
not only completely unsuccessful in their mission, but
were even maltreated by the Lombards. Before night
arrived, Paul and his party, after arranging* matters
with Desiderius, seized the unfortunate pair and put
out their eyes. The father died after three days in the
monastery of St. Agatha in Trastevere, but Sergius
lingered on in a cell of the Lateran. “All these evils,” §
concludes the papal biographer, “were brought about
by the machinations of. Desiderius, the king of the
Lombards.” Such is the clear and consistent narrative
of these events in the Book of the Popes; and it is, in
its principal features, corroborated by what can be

placing the affair of Charlemagne and Desiderata after these events,
he is also wrong in his chronology. The Pope’s letter on the subject
of the marriage supposes that Sergius is still alive and acting for the
Pope. Cf Jaffé, Regest., sub. ann. 771.

1 “Cupiens eos noctis silentio propter insidias inimicorum salvos
introduci Romam.” JZ. P. Twice the biographer asserts the Pope’s
wish to save the lives of Christopher and Sergius.

2 “ Tnientesque cum eo (Desiderio) impium consilium.” 0.

3 “Heec omnia mala per iniquas immisiones Longobardorum
Desiderii Regis provenerunt.” 0,

STEPHEN (III) Iv. 387

gathered from John Turmair of the report of Tassilo’s
secretary.

Had we no further materials than the Leber Pontt- ae of
jicalts supplies us with, we might be said to have an Stepan
easily intelligible account of the downfall of Christopher andCharle-
and Sergius. But there exists in the Caroline Code ae
letter! from the Pope, addressed to Queen Bertrada and
Charlemagne, which gives a very different account of the
part played by Desiderius. In that letter, those ‘most
wicked men,’ Christopher and Sergius, are represented as
having come to an understanding with Dodo, the envoy
of Carlomann, and as having attempted to kill the
Pope. By good fortune, Stephen managed to escape to
Desiderius, who happened to be at Rome at the time,
as he had come to treat about the ‘rights’ of the Holy
See. On the Pope’s flight the city was barred against
him. But by degrees, as the perfidy of Christopher be-
came clearer, his party fell away from him, and at length,
much against their will, Christopher and Sergius were
brought out to the Pope. Stephen was, with difficulty,
able to save their lives, “which the whole people were
anxious to take,”? and whilst he was making arrangements
to bring them back into the city during the night, “those
who were ever on the watch for them” seized them and
put out their eyes, “without our concurrence in any way.”
Stephen assures Charlemagne, in conclusion, that but for
the help of God, and “his most excellent son Desiderius,”
he, his clergy, and his people would all have been in
danger of death; that Dodo was to blame for the
whole trouble, and that he had received from Desiderius%

1 Cod. Car., 48, ap. G.; 50 /.

2 “Quos interficere universus populus nitebantur.” Jd.

3 “Nobis convenit cum excellentissimo. ... Desiderio, .... et
omnes justitias b. Petri ab. eo plenius et in integro suscepimus.” 70.

388 STEPHEN (III.) IV.

full satisfaction with regard to the ‘rights’ ot the
Church.

So improbable seem the statements in this letter, that
many authors, “with some show of reason,”’ have main-
tained that it was written by the Pope under compulsion,
when he was in the hands of Desiderius. If the state-
ments in this letter were true, it would mean that four
men suddenly showed themselves false to the characters
they had previously borne. Christopher and Sergius
had, up to this time, proved themselves most devoted
adherents of the popes. They had risked all they had in
their service, had been duly appreciated? by them, and
had done everything for Stephen himself. Dodo also had
received warm praise as a friend of the popes ; whereas,
on the contrary, Desiderius, who both before and after
these events showed himself anything but a friend of the
popes, and had given abundant evidence of being a man
of no character, a liar and a knave, is in this letter
represented as the saviour of the Pope. If the letter
were written under compulsion, its object is obvious.
Dodo’s name is dragged into it to foment discord between
the two brothers, Charlemagne and Carlomann, an object
we shall soon see Desiderius more openly working to
bring about.

Of course it may have been that the calumnies of
Afiarta and his friends did their work, and that the Pope

1 Says even James, History of Charlemagne, p. 135, note.

” Pope Paul, in a letter (Cod. C., ep. 36 G.) to Pippin, speaks of
Christopher in the very highest terms. “Nostri praedecessoris ac
germani .... simul et noster sincerus atque probatissimus fidelis
extitit, et in omnibus existit, et satisfacti sumus de ejus immaculata fide
et firma cordis constantia.” Stephen himself had spoken (Cod. C., ep.
45 G.) of Sergius as “fidelissimus noster” ; and the same epithet was
applied to Dodo by Paul (ep. 22 G.), if we may suppose him the same
man as the Dodo in question.

STEPHEN (III.) Iv. 389

became suspicious of his two chief and powerful ministers.
And as suspicion begets suspicion, it may have been that
Christopher and his son began to mistrust the goodwill
of the Pope towards them. Hence it may have been
that Desiderius temporarily hoodwinked the Pope, and
thus wrought his end in contriving the ruin of his able
opponents. But of all these things, the reader, now in
possession of the facts of the case, must judge for himself.
It is quite certain that if the Pope had been deluded
by Desiderius, the delusion did not last long. For when
he sent to Desiderius to ask for the fulfilment of the
promises he had made on oath over the body of St. Peter,
he received this sarcastic answer: “Be content that I
removed Christopher and Sergius, who were ruling you,
out of your way, and ask not for ‘rights.’ Besides, if I do
not continue to help you, great trouble will befall you.
For Carlomann, king of the Franks, is the friend of
Christopher and Sergius, and will be wishful to come to
Rome and seize you.”? Well might Pope Hadrian, who
is our authority for this reply of Desiderius, add, “See
of what value is the good faith of Desiderius
Paul Afiarta seems to have retained considerable power

”
!

in the city. For as soon as Stephen was struck down
with his last illness, he at once exiled a number of the
most influential as well of the clergy as of the laity, and

1 Not only did later authors of the Middle Ages set down the death
of Christopher and his son ‘to the craft’ of Desiderius (¢/, e.g., Odericus
Vitalis in his sketch of this Pope’s life), but, as we have seen, so also did
the contemporary Creontius. So too, finally, it is certain, did Stephen,
at least later on, sometime before his death. For he told Hadrian, who
afterwards succeeded him, that their cruel treatment was all the work of
Desiderius, and had been the cause of grave loss to him (Stephen).
(Cf. L. P. in vit. Had.)

2 Z. P.in vit. Had, Pope Hadrian was told the above by Stephen
himself,

Desiderius
makes
trouble in
Istria,
y68-772.

390 STEPHEN (III) IV.

imprisoned others.!_ Moreover, as we shall see in the Lz/e
of Hadrian, eight days before Stephen died, the wretched
Sergius was dragged forth from his place of confinement
in the Lateran, by the orders of the same brutal
chamberlain, and strangled. We shall also, with no little
satisfaction, see, in the same place, that Paul, even in this
life, reaped the just reward of his iniquity.

To work out his purpose of subjecting all Italy to his
sway, Desiderius caused trouble not only in Rome but in
other places. We have seen? that it was decided that the
bishop of Grado should be primate of Venetia and Istria.
But Desiderius, correctly concluding that if the bishops of
these provinces were subject to Aquileia instead, he would
have more power over them, some time during Stephen’s
reign actively *employed himself in fomenting a schism in
those parts. His efforts were crowned with success, and
the bishops of Istria took it upon themselves to consecrate
others without the consent of the patriarch of Grado. The
patriarch accordingly appealed to the Pope. Stephen at
once wrote to the rebellious bishops and to John of Grado
himself. The bishops he suspended, and commanded to
return to their obedience under pain of excommunication.
John he consoled ; and assured him, that, like his pre-
decessor Stephen III., he would always consult the
patriarch’s interests; and that the subjects (jideles) of
Blessed Peter would strive to defend Istria against its
enemies, as they did to protect “our province * of Rome and

17. P, in vit. Had. Hadrian recalled, we are told, “judices illos
.... tam de clero, quam de militia, qui in exilium ad transitum
D. Stephani P. missi fuerant a Paulo cubiculario.”

2 S7Zp ae ne Tle

* Cf. Dandolo in Chron., ap. R. I. S., xii.; Ughelli, 74. Sac., v.;
Muratori, Azmal., ad an. 772.

4“Confidat sanctitas tua, quia fideles b. Petri —sicut hanc
nostram Romanorum provinciam, et exarchatum Rayennatium, et

STEPHEN (Ill) Iv. 3901

the exarchate of Ravenna.” To urge the Pope to adopt
strong measures in support of the patriarch of Grado,
Maurice, the doge of Venice, sent an embassy to Rome.
But the death of Stephen prevented the negotiation from
having any practical issue.

Before bringing this Pope’s biography to a close, it is The seveu
worth while mentioning that in the Lzder Pontzficalis he is puhope
said to have been a diligent observer of ecclesiastical tradition
in the matter of church ceremonial. In connection with
which, he decreed that every Sunday one of the seven
‘cardinales hebomadarii,’ now known as cardinal or suburbi-
carian bishops, should in turn say Mass in the Lateran on
the altar of St. Peter, and should say at it the prayer
‘Gloria in excelsis Deo.’ From this weekly duty these
‘cardinal bishops’ (who are here mentioned for the first
time) were called ‘hebdomadarii” The altar of St. Peter
here spoken of is a table of wood, on which it is believed
that St. Peter himself offered up the Holy Sacrifice ; and
which is enclosed at this day in the marble High Altar of
the Lateran basilica. And to this day also, as in the other
patriarchal basilicas,! only the Pope or a specially appointed
cardinal can say Mass at the High Altar. A writer of the
thirteenth century, John the Deacon,2 enumerates these
cardinal bishops as follows: “First is the bishop of Ostia,
whose office it is to consecrate the Pope; then the bishops

ipsam quoque vestram provinciam pari modo ab inimicorum oppres-
sionibus semper defendere procurent.” Ep. ap. Dand., Chvon. The
appeal of John and both the letters of the Pope are also printed
M. G. H. Epp, iii. 711 f. To John of Grado the Pope is “omnium
sacerdotalium preesulum summe pastor et domine, qui apostolorum
principis Petri b. satis dignam contines fidem et vices,” etc.

1 The cardinal celebrants in these are cardinal priests.

2 De eccl. Lateran, c. 8. A similar list of the seven ‘hebdomadary’
bishops, attached to the Lateran, had already been given by Peter
Mallius in the first half of the preceding century (Duchesne, Z. P.,

i. 484).

Death of
Pope
Stephen.

392 STEPHEN (III) IV.

of S. Rufina or Silvia Candida, Porto, Albano, Tusculum,
Sabina and Przneste. No doubt they were the same as
were attached to the Lateran from the beginning. Now-
adays there are six cardinal bishops. For in the beginning
of the twelfth century, Porto and St. Rufina were united.

Stephen, whom some modern historians, with no little
reason perhaps, call weak, and others, with no reason, call
unscrupulous, died February Ist or 3rd, 772, and was buried
Insot.) efer's.

On the question as to whether or no Stephen was really
a man of weak character, we may remark that he was not
so indeed to his biographer, who, as we have already
noticed, calls him a man of character (ver strenuus). He
was much respected by his successor Hadrian, who is, on
all hands, allowed to have been an exceptionally strong-
minded man. And it may be urged that it is easy to call
a man weak who has to give way before overwhelming
odds. King Pippin, the great support of this Pope’s pre-
decessors, was dead. Pippin’s successors, Charlemagne
and Carlomann, were young, disunited, and with formid-
able enemies around them, whereas Desiderius had had
considerable experience in the art of ruling. And whether
he bullied or hoodwinked Stephen in the matter of the
murder of Christopher and Sergius, he did not attempt,
under him, that violent seizure of papal territory that he
began under Hadrian. Though it may be granted that
the current of events in the beginning of his reign flowed
too strongly to be stemmed by the most powerful, still,
in the abandonment of Christopher, if the current was
strong, it can scarcely be questioned that the swimmer
was weak. The treatment of his primicerius by Stephen
looks very like the cowardly surrendering of Wentworth
by Charles I. Hence, though from his tender nursing of
Pope Paul and what his biographer tells us of his pious

STEPHEN (ill.) Iv. 393

works, it may fairly be concluded that Stephen’s heart
was good, it can scarcely be questioned that his will was
weak. The events of his reign may serve as another
illustration of the fact that for the governed the rule! of
the weak is sometimes worse than that of the bad. The
wicked prince is not unfrequently strong enough to reserve
the right of doing wrong to himself. But under the
weak sovereign every one does “what is right in his own
eyes.”

Cardinal Tripepi calls! attention to the fact that Stephen
various calendars, martyrologies, etc., such as the ancient es
calendar of the saints of Sicily, the calendars and martyr-
ologies of Ferrarius, Menard, St. Malo, etc., number
Stephen among the saints, and assign his feast to February
Ist; and that the inhabitants of Syracuse endeavoured to
induce the Holy See to extend the worship (the ‘cult’),
which was there paid to him, to the whole Church,

1 Mem., etc., p. 345

HADRIAN 1.

A.D. 772-795.
OO

Sources.—The greater length of this contemporary biography in
the Book of the Popes is due to the fact that there are there set
forth in minute detail the labours of the Pope on the restora-
tion of the churches, walls, and aqueducts of the city. Apart
from the narration of these architectural details, practically the
only events of Hadrian’s life therein contained are his relations
with the Lombards. Duchesne, Z. P., i. ccxxxiv. f., holds that
the historical portion of this biography—z.e., the first part, which
treats of the Lombard question—was written in 774, and that
the rest was the work of different compilers who wrote at
different periods; and hence that the works of Hadrian on
the churches are set down in chronological order. For the
other actions of his important reign, we must look to other
sources—such as his letters, of which there are forty-nine in the
Code of Charlemagne. Some letters of Alcuin and others in
the Monumenta Alcuiniana (Bib. Rer. Ger., vi, or M. G.
Epp., iv.) are useful. The Monumenta Alcuiniana (ed. Watten-
bach and Duemmler, Berlin, 1873) contains the anonymous
life of Alcuin written in 829, his poem De Pont. e¢ SS. Eborac.,
his life of S. Willibrord, and his letters, with a few of those of
other men. His letters also ap. JZ. G. Efp., iv. The Monu-
menta Carolina (ed. Jaffé, Berlin, 1867) contains, besides the
Codex Carolinus, the letters and ancient lives of Charlemagne.
In dating his letters, this Pope was the first to substitute (an.
781) his own episcopal years for those of the emperor. (Z. P.,
i, ed. Mom., p. vil. n.). And, as bearing on the same point,
it may be noted, with Dr. Hodgkin (/¢ady, etc., vili. p. 55 n.),
that “the latest extant document in which a Pope dates by

HADRIAN L 305

the years of an Eastern emperor is xcviii. (or 90) of the Regesta
di Farfa, and is dated on the roth day before the kalends of
March in the 33rd of Constantine V., and the 21st of his son
Leo IV., equivalent to a.D. 772.” And it is under Hadrian
that ‘formulas really diplomatic’ begin to appear in the papal
documents. The Scriftwm and the Datum reveal a regularly
constituted chancellary; and the formula, lz perpetuum, which
is found for the first time under this Pope, well corresponds by
its solemnity to the newly-acquired importance of the Papacy,
as is well observed by Rodolico (Note Paleograjiche e Diplomatiche
sul Privilegio Pontificio, pp. 9, 10). Malmesbury, Wendover, the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, etc., give us information on Hadrian’s
work in connection with this country.

The Chronicles of the Franks, on which, besides the works
cited above, consult Les Sources de Vhistoire de France, by A.
Molinier, Paris, 1902, i. c. 14.

On the ‘Adoptionist’ heresy, the works of Alcuin are the
most important authorities.

For the Iconoclast controversy, we have the Acts of the
Seventh General Council; and those of Frankfort, as well as
the so-called Caroline books, of which more in the text.

The industrious Mabillon brought to light (AZuseum [talicum,
i, pt. ii, p- 38 f., ed. Paris, 1724) a short ancient life of this Pope
by an anonymous monk of the monastery of Nonantula. The
life is of no great importance. The monk who wrote this brief
sketch seems to have been under the impression that the Pope
Hadrian, who died at Nonantula, was Pope Hadrian I., instead
of Hadrian III. Under this mistake he compiled, accurately
enough as far as it goes, a life of Hadrian I., to which he
appended certain events that had taken place in connection with
the body (really that of Hadrian III.) of the Pope that reposed
in his monastery. Hence it may be concluded that the Lie
was drawn up in the tenth century. For the facts of the story
which occurs at the end of it, viz., of monks breaking into Hadrian
III.’s tomb to get his vestments for their use, must have taken
place when the tradition of the Pope’s burial was fairly fresh,
and when the vestments in which the body was clothed might
be supposed, by the intending violators of its tomb, to be still
undecayed. And as the writer speaks of a part of the said

- 306 HADRIAN I.

vestments as still in the monastery, we shall not perhaps be
far wrong in assigning the tenth century as the date of the
composition of this anonymous life.

Modern Works.—A study of the life of Hadrian will be

much helped by studying the lives of Charlemagne and Alcuin.

A

useful work in this connection is Alcuin et Charlemagne, pat

M. Francois Monnier, Paris, 1864. F. Lorenz’s Life of Alcuin
has been translated into English by Slee, London, 1837. There
are numerous biographies of Charlemagne. I have used those
by James (London, 1832); Dr. Hodgkin (London, 1897), and
Davis (London, 1900).

EMPERORS OF THE KING OF THE KING OF THE
EAST. LOMBARDS. FRANKS.
Constantine (Copro- Desiderius, 756-774. Charlemagne, 771-8009.

nymus), 741-775.
Weoul V7. 75-700:
Constantine VI. (Por-
phyrogenitus), 780-797.
Irene, 780-790.

Theim- THE pontificate of Pope Hadrian is important, not only

portance of

the reign of because it was the longest of any in the Middle Ages, but
also because of the momentous events that took place
during it, and in which he took a very great share. In
his reign, not only was the temporal power of the popes
placed on a still firmer basis by the confirmation of
Pippin’s deed of gift by his son Charlemagne, but the
power of its greatest enemies, the Lombards, was broken
for ever. On the one side, too, in the East, the heresy
of the Image-breakers was dealt such a blow by the
Seventh General Council that it never regained its former
strength ; and on the other side, in the far West, a new
heresy was so promptly attacked that it disappeared not
long after the death of the Pope. And that Rome, their
dwelling-place, might share in the immortality decreed by
our Divine Lord for the popes themselves, might be
indeed ‘eternal,’ as early imperial coins proclaimed it to

Hadrian.

HADRIAN I. 397

be, Hadrian practically rebuilt the city on the seven hills,
Its churches he restored, its walls he re-erected, its
aqueducts he again caused to flow. And last, but not
least, he greatly contributed to the advance of European
civilisation, by using the influence which he had with
Charlemagne in helping that great prince (before whose
time, as the old chronicler! ingenuously remarks, no atten-
tion was paid to the liberal arts in Gaul), both by advice and
by gifts of books and masters, in his efforts to light the
torch of learning in his vast dominions. All this he did
in despite of turbulent officials, both cleric and lay, whom
it required all the power of Charlemagne to keep in check.

The author of all these noble deeds, “one ot the greatest
popes of the eighth century,” writes Hodgkin, was, as is
so frequently the case with the doers of great things,
himself of noble birth. He was a Roman, and not
unworthy of the name. His family, at once noble and
powerful, belonging apparently to the new military
aristocracy, had their home? in the fifth ecclesiastical
quarter, that known as the Via Lata. Left an orphan
whilst still very young, by the death of both his parents,
the little Hadrian was carefully trained by an uncle, one
Theodotus, who had formerly held the title of consul and
duke, and was then primicerius of the notaries. There
is still extant a marble tablet, in the Church of St. Angela
in Pescheria, which testifies to the piety of Theodotus.
It records how, for the good of his soul, and the pardon
of his sins, he restored the church whilst primicerius.®

1 An. Lauriss., ap. 4. G. SS., i: 171. “Ante ipsum enim domnum
regem Carolum in Gallia nullum studium fuerat liberalium artium.”

2 Speaking of S. Maria in Cosmedin, Murray, Hand-book for kome,
p. 213, says that under the portico there is “a very rude eighth century
relief of arches, representing” the house of Pope Hadrian. I can only
say that, when a few weeks ago I there looked for it, I could not find it.

3 The recent excavations, already spoken of at length under John

Early life of
Hadrian,
and
character.

398 HADRIAN I.

Under the care of such a tutor, we need not wonder that
his biographer speaks of the hours which Hadrian spent,
whilst still a young laic, in the Church of St. Mark,
which was near the parental mansion. Not content with
prayer, he strove to subdue his passions by fasting* and
the use of the hair-shirt. To the utmost of his ability
also he gave alms to the poor. His good deeds were the
talk of Rome. The knowledge of his virtues caused
Pope Paul to order him to become a cleric. Paul then
named him a regionary notary, and afterwards ordained
him subdeacon. By Stephen (III.) IV. he was made a
deacon. The reception of the diaconate made him
work harder than ever at preaching the Gospel and the
other duties of his office. Being such by birth and train-
ing, we can readily believe his biographer,when he assures
us that Hadrian was as polished and refined in his mind
as he was shapely and handsome in body; that he was a
firm upholder of his country and the faith, and that he .

VII., revealed the fact that he was the donor of the Church of S. Maria
Antica. On one of the walls of a little chapel, where there are frescoes
of the martyrdom of SS. Quiricus and Julitta, there are to be seen
seven figures. In the centre,,Our Lady on a throne with Our Lord,
as a Child, in her arms, with SS. Peter and Paul on either side of her;
on her left are SS. Julitta and Pope Zachary (741-752), with a square
nimbus, showing he was then alive ; and on her right St. Quiricus and
Theodotus, who, turned towards Our Lady, is offering her a Church,
that of S. Maria Antica. Over the head of Theodotus, in white, is
the following rude inscription :—
‘x (T)heodotus Prim(icer)o Defensorum et D(ispen)-
satore Sancte Dei Ge(nitri)cis Senperque Birgo Mar(i)a
Que appellatur Antiqua.
Cf. Archivio della R. Soc. Rom., 1900, p. 524.

1 “ Indutusque cilicio, jejuniis corpus suum macerabat.” JZ. P., from
which all the above is taken. From the contemptuous manner in
which many moderns write of such aids as fasting, etc., to the
subjection of our passions, have we to conclude that they subdue

their passions without having to practise that self-denial which Our
Lord declared necessary ?

HADRIAN 1. 300

was the father of the poor, and a most reverent observer
of ecclesiastical traditions.

Before Pope Stephen was actually dead, the people Hlectea
came together to elect Hadrian, so great was their love ee
for him,' and no sooner had he passed away than Hadrian
was elected to succeed him (February 3, 772) by the
unanimous vote of clergy and people? The anonymous
monk of Nonantula gives in full the decree of Hadrian’s
election, which, mutatis mutandis, is in the prescribed
form which occurs in the Liber Diurnus. This document
sets forth that in response to the prayer of all the clergy
and people® together assembled, the deacon Hadrian
was, on account of his exceptional merits, unanimously
elected, and that the decree of election was placed in the
archives of the Vatican palace.

It would seem not at all unlikely that this prompt action
of the Roman people in finding a successor for Stephen
was to anticipate any measures on the part of Paul Afiarta
to procure a pontiff who might be at the beck of the
Lombard. The moment he was elected, Hadrian not
only gave a striking proof of his determined character,
but showed Paul who was to be master in Rome. The
very hour (confestem eadem hora) he was elected, he
commanded the recall of those whom Paul had banished
during the illness of Stephen. Further, in accordance

1 “ Ferventissimo affectu a populo Romano diligeretur.” Z. P.

2“WHic (Hadrianus)....ad ordinem episcopatus communi
concordia omnium clericorum ac populorum electus est.” (Axon. wit.,
ap. Mab.) According to Jaffé, his election would have to be set down to
Feb. I.

3 “Td est cuncti sacerdotes et proceres ecclesize et universus clerus
atque optimates, et universa militaris praesentia seu cives honesti, et
cuncta generalitas populi. ... Hoc vero decretum a nobis factum,
subter manibus propriis roborantes, in archivio. . . . recondi fecimus,
mense Feb.” Anon. vit.; of. Lib. Diurn., which was one of the
sources of the anonymous monk.

~ 400 HADRIAN I.

with what was perhaps a custom, he set free those who
were in prison for one crime or another And certainly,
in accordance with custom, he drew up a profession of
faith, which he sent to “his most reverend brethren and
to all the faithful.” ?
The deceit No sooner was Hadrian consecrated (February 9) than
eee he had to receive a deputation from the Lombard king.
That monarch had evidently made up his mind that
it was to be now or never with him if he was to become
lord of all Italy. Charlemagne, against whom he was
personally enraged, because that prince had repudiated
his daughter, he thought he could afford to despise. He
was young, was surrounded by enemies, especially the
Saxons, against whom he had to struggle for thirty-three
years (772-805), and had to fear the chances of a civil war.
For when Carlomann died, in December 771, his widow
Gilberga, with her two sons and some of his chief nobles,
had fled to the court of Desiderius, “for no reason what-
ever,’ says Eginhard.2? And as these sons of Carlomann
were but children, the great bulk of his people had offered
his kingdom to Charlemagne, who had thus become sole
king of the Franks.4
Resolving, however, to try the fox’s skin before the lion’s,
Desiderius sent an embassy to Hadrian, hoping to induce
him to place his trust in him (Desiderius), and assuring
the Pope that he wished to live at peace with him.
When, in reply, Hadrian urged the previous bad faith of

1Z.P. Cf. Agnellus, who states that Pope Paul did the same thing
(Agnell. in vit. Sergii).

2 Anon. vit.; cf. Lib. Diurn, BY Val. Carros

4 1b. Cf. Annal. Eginhard. and Annal. Metens. Hence the
language of Gregorovius, Rome, etc., ii. p. 344, that Charlemagne
“seized the territories belonging to his nephew,” is inaccurate. CF
ee Hist. of Charlemagne, where that point is clearly treated (p.
139 f.).

HADRIAN f. 401

their king towards Stephen in the affair of Christopher and
Sergius, the envoys took an oath that Desiderius would
restore to Hadrian the ‘rights’ he had failed to restore
to Stephen, and that he would really live in peace with
the Pope! Trusting to their oaths, Hadrian despatched
Stephen, a regionary notary and saccellarius (paymaster),
and Paul Afiarta to treat with the Lombard king. But
they had not got beyond Perugia when they learnt that
Desiderius, as usual without any better reason than his
desire for the ‘unification of Italy, had seized Faventia,
the duchy of Ferrara (both of which he had given
up in 757), and Commacchio (Comiaclum), had beset
Ravenna itself, and was harrying the whole province?
A deputation came from Archbishop Leo of Ravenna
to implore help from the Pope. Hadrian thereupon
ordered his envoys to proceed on their journey to
Desiderius, with letters in which, as might be expected,
the Pope upbraided the Lombard for his twofold breach
of faith Meanwhile Gilberga and her sons had arrived
at the Lombard court, and their cause was at once
espoused by the king. “And hence,’? says the papal
biographer, in one of the rare passages in which, in set
terms, he gives us any of the motives that ‘prompted
any of the acts he relates, “Desiderius used every art
to try and induce the Pope to come and visit him, in
order that he (the Pope) might anoint as kings the
two sons of Carlomann. For the Lombard was very
desirous of bringing about a division in the kingdom
of the Franks, a coolness in the friendship between

the Pope and Charlemagne, and the subjection of Rome

LLP: 2 Direct from the Z. P.

8 “Et ob hoc ipsum sanct. preesulem ad se properandum seducere
conabatur, ut ipsos Carolomanni filios reges ungeret cupiens divisionem
jn regno Francorum immittere, etc..... cunctamque Italiam sui
regni.... potestati subjugare.” Jd.

VOL, IsP¥. 11. 26

The

punish-
ment of
Afiarta,

772

402 HADRIAN f

and all Italy to his own sway.” Although Desiderius
promised the Pope that he would restore the cities
if he would come to him, Hadrian firmly refused to
go. When the Pope’s determination became known,
Paul Afiarta assured Desiderius that he would see to
it that Hadrian complied with the king’s wishes, for,
if necessary, he would put a rope round the Pope's
legs and drag him to the Lombard court by the heels.*
He set off by Arimini to fulfil his engagement. But
there was already a rope round the boaster’s own
neck.

When Paul left Rome, men had the courage to let the
Pope know that the unfortunate secundicerius Sergius had
been dragged forth from his cell in the Lateran and
strangled and stabbed in the ‘via Merulana’—a street as
well known now as in the eighth century—by order of
Afiarta. Hadrian made the most careful enquiries? into
the matter, had the accomplices of Paul arrested, and, in
response to the wishes of all the people, handed them
over to the ‘prefect of the city’ to be tried for murder.
Death, or exile to Constantinople, was meted out to the
culprits. ;

In accordance with secret instructions conveyed to him
from the Pope, Leo, the archbishop of Ravenna, caused
Paul to be seized as he passed through Arimini. And
when he received from Rome the account of the trial of
Paul’s agents, the archbishop went beyond the Pope’s
orders. He not only handed Paul over to the secular arm,
to the consular of Ravenna (consulart Ravennatium urbis),
but, despite the strict orders of the Pope to the contrary,

Be lek

2 Details in the Z. P. Hadrian caused the bodies of Christopher
and Sergius to be honourably buried in St. Peter’s. The whole action
of this Pope with regard to those two men shows that he did not
regard them as false to his predecessor.

HADRIAN I. 403

and despite every effort! the Pope could make to save him,
as he only desired exile for the accused, the archbishop
had the wretched man put to death. Some days after,
however, troubled in mind at his disobedience, Leo wrote
to the Pope and begged him to excuse the act, as, after
all, the blood of the innocent had been avenged in the
death of Paul. But this Hadrian would by no means do;
he told the archbishop that he must bear the blame of
Paul’s death, for he himself (Hadrian) had, on the contrary,
wished to spare the man’s life that he might have had an
opportunity to do penance.?

Whilst the affair of Paul was in progress, Desiderius Desiderius
was not idle) He marched southward with a large oe
army, laying waste with fire and sword? the whole ae
country, from Sinigagila on the Adriatic to Blera on?”
the borders of Tuscany. The inhabitants of the last-
mentioned town, supposing that there was peace,* were
massacred by the Lombards whilst gathering in their
harvest, and their town was reduced to ashes. And then>
“after the manner® of his ancestors,” he proceeded to
harry the duchy of Rome. Can anyone be astonished
that the popes resisted such barbarians by every means
in their power?

Before appealing to the Franks, Hadrian tried every
expedient. Letter after letter,s embassy after embassy,

1 Again full details in the Z. P.

2 “Tta illi dirigens in responsis, quod ipse (Leo) videat, quid in Paulo
operatus est.” ZL. P.

3 Jo, “Plura homicidia, et depredationes atque incendia in ipsis
finibus perpetrantes.”

4“Blerani in fiducia pacis, ad recolligendas segetes .... cum
mulieribus egrederentur, irruerunt repente super eos ipsi Longobardi,”

etc... £6.
5 “Desiderius .... et Romane ecclesiz castra et pradia more

antecessorum vastabat.” Anon. vit.; of. L. P.
6 “Szepius atque szepius b. presul tam per obsecrationis litteras,
quamque per missos eidem Desiderio direxit,” etc. Z. P

404 HADRIAN 1.

Desiderius
marches on
Rome, 773.

Ambassie
dors of
Charle-
magne
arrive in
Rome.

was sent from Rome to the Lombard to induce him to
pause in his career of violence, and restore his ill-
gotten goods. If Desiderius made any reply, it was
only to the effect that the Pope must come and see
him. To which request Hadrian always replied that he
would certainly do so when Desiderius had restored the
cities.

Negotiation was clearly useless. The Lombard was on
the march for Rome itself with his son Adalgis and the
widow and two sons of Carlomann. But Hadrian was
equal to the occasion. He not only, compelled by
necessity, sent messengers by sea to Charlemagne to
implore his aid, but he collected troops from all parts,
even from the Pentapolis, and hurriedly strengthened the
fortifications of the city. He then sent three cardinal-
bishops to Desiderius to forbid him, under pain of excom-
munication, entering the Roman duchy. Whether he
had faith enough to fear a papal sentence of excom-
munication, or policy enough to dread the power of the
Franks, certain it is that he fell back in confusion from
Viterbo.?

Desiderius had not long withdrawn from the papal
boundaries ere there arrived in Rome ambassadors from
Charlemagne (among whom seems to have been our
countryman Alcuin—A/duznus, deliciosus regis), who came
to see for themselves whether Desiderius had really made
restitution to the Pope, as he had assured the Franks that
he had done. Of course they found that anything but resti-
tution had been effected by the false Lombard. Nor could

1“ Necessitate compulsus.” Z. P.; of Annales Tilliant, etc., ap.
MM. G.SSy ke

2 “Susceptoque eodem obligationis (anathematis) verbo .... Rex
illico cum magna reverentia a civitate Viterbiense confusus ad propria
reversus est.” LZ, P., n. 25.

HADRIAN I. 405

they, though they interviewed Desiderius on their return
journey, obtain any concessions from him. In company
with ambassadors from the Pope, they returned to their
king and told him the state of the case. Urged by the
papal envoys to act in behalf of their master, Charlemagne
at first tried pacific measures. His envoys were com-
missioned to offer Desiderius no less than 14,000! gold
solidi, if he would give up the territory he had seized.
But Desiderius was fanatically obstinate.

Charlemagne now prepared for war. His troops Expedia
appeared at the passes of the Alps. Whether favoured meee
by treachery or not, he successfully accomplished the ~'’*~
difficult task of conveying his forces over the Alps.?
Charlemagne’s secretary and biographer, Eginhard, assures
us that had he not been anxious to describe his master’s
character, rather than his wars, he would have told us
“how great was the toil of the Franks in overcoming
the trackless chain of mountains, with peaks towering to
the skies, and sharp and perilous rocks.” Desiderius fled
to Pavia, and there prepared to stand a siege in that
strong city. Adalgis, with the widow and sons of
Carlomann, shut themselves up in Verona.

One of the immediate results of the appearance of Charle- The duchy
magne in Italy was the defection of part of the subjects ee
of Desiderius, viz., the inhabitants of the duchy of Spoleto. eaiere e
Already, before the descent of the Frankish king into Italy, men:
some of the chief men of the Lombard cities of Rieti and

Spoleto placed themselves under the Pope, took an oath

1 All this direct from the Z. P. The papal envoy asked Charle-
magne’s help “quod ipse legitimus tutor et defensor esset illius
(Romanz) plebis, quoniam illum preedecessor suus b, m. Stephanus
P. unctione sacra liniens in Regem ac Patricium Romanorum
ordinarat.” (Chron. Moissiac., ap. M. G. SS., xii. 28.)

2 Cf. Egimhard, zm vit. Car., c. 6, L. P. and the various annals.
(James’ Life of Charlemagne, Pp. 170 Seg.)

406 HADRIAN I

of fidelity to him, and cut their long hair in the Roman
fashion. We have already seen evidences of a desire on
the part of the duchy of Spoleto to attach its fortunes
to those of Rome and the popes; and on the present
occasion the entire people, but for dread of their sove-
reign, would have been glad to follow the example set
them by their principal men. When, however, their
countrymen came flying from the North and told them
of the forcing of the passes of the Alps, the fear of
Desiderius, which had up to this. restrained them,
disappeared, and they flocked to the Pope and besought
him to accept them as his subjects. Hadrian could not
but receive them. And in St. Peter’s all swore® to be the
faithful subjects of the apostle, of his vicar, Pope Hadrian,
and of all his successors. After the hair of all had been cut
in the Roman style, Hadrian confirmed one Hildeprand,
whom they had themselves chosen, as their duke. Certain
cities of the exarchate (Fermo, Osimo and Ancona), which
had either never been yielded up to the popes, or had
again been seized by the Lombards, followed the example
of Spoleto. Here, beyond all doubt, we have an example

1 “Spoletini et Reatini, aliquanti eorum utiles persone .
Hadriano se tradiderunt et in fide .... pontificis jurantes more
Romanorum tonsurati sunt.” ZL. P.

2 “Confestim generaliter ad Pont. confluentes advenerunt, (et)... .
deprecati sunt ut eos in servitio b. Petri susciperet.” J0., n. 32.

3“ Omnes unanimiter .... jurejurando promiserunt eidem Dei
Apostolo in servitio ejus, atque Vicarii ipsius Hadriani atque omnibus
successoribus ejus fideliter permansuros.” Jd. And hence Hildeprand
dated his documents “in the times of the thrice blessed and coangelic
lord Hadrian, pontiff and universal Pope.” Cf Regist. Farfense, c.
(or xci.), cited by Duchesne, Z. /., i. 516. Later on, after 776, as
though he preferred a master at a distance to one close at hand,
we find him dating charters by the regnal years of Charlemagne, king
of the Franks and Lombards.

4 Z, P. Mention is there also made of similar action on the part
of a ‘castellum Felicitatis ’ (or Fulginatis), which is perhaps Foligno
(Fulginium), a city of the duchy of Spoleto, on the Flaminian Way. It

HADRIAN I. 407

of one way in which temporal power was absolutely thrust
into the hands of the popes by the people themselves.

Arrived before Pavia in the autumn (773), Charlemagne The block-
resolved to reduce it by starvation, and took measures ac- Pe 773:
cordingly by surrounding the city with lines of circumval-
lation. And that his purpose of staying there till the place
was unconditionally surrendered might be clear, he sent for
his wife and children. Whilst the blockade was still being
maintained, detachments of the Franks were sent in all
directions to bring about the reduction of the other cities.
Verona surrendered on the mere approach of Charlemagne.

After the siege of Pavia had lasted some six months,
Charlemagne resolved to gratify his great desire of visiting

the tombs of the Apostles, the more so as the festival

of Easter was at hand Taking with him a considerable
number of his chief ecclesiastics and nobles (epzscofz,
duces, graphiones), and a large body of troops, he set

out with his accustomed speed so as to be in Rome by coals
Holy Saturday (April 2). Astonished and yet delighted goes to
at the news of this sudden resolve of the Frankish “°™°77*
monarch, Hadrian made haste to receive him with
becoming honour.

Some twenty-four miles from Rome, at a place known
as ‘ad Novas, the ruins of which are to be seen near Lake
Bracciano, Charlemagne was met by the ‘judges’ with
the military standards (dandora). Nearer the city he
was received by the ‘trained bands’ and all the school-
children bearing palm and olive branches in their hands,

is more probably the same as the modern Citta di Castello, which
stands on the site of the ancient Tifernum Tiberinum, and belonged
to Lombard Tuscany and to the duchy of Chiusi.

1 This passage fixes the date of the commencement of the blockade.
“Magnum desiderium habens ad limina apostolorum properandi,
considerans quod et sacratissima Paschalis festivitas appropinquasset.”

an?

408 HADRIAN I,

and chanting the praises of the Frankish king. There
were also sent forth in his honour “the venerable crosses
and the sacred banners,” as was wont to be done when,
under the old rvéezme, the exarch came to Rome. We
are told that when Charlemagne saw the sacred crosses,
he descended from his horse, and with his nobles proceeded
on foot to St. Peter’s. Arrived there, the king mounted
the steps, devoutly kissing each one of them as he
ascended. After embracing one another, Hadrian and
Charlemagne entered the basilica together, which rang
with the antiphon: “Blessed is he that cometh in the
name of the Lord.” When all present had returned
thanks to God at the confession of St. Peter for the
victories He had granted to the arms of the Franks,
through the intercession of His apostle, Charlemagne
assured Hadrian (ep. 56 G.) that he and his Franks
had undertaken this expedition not for gold or territory,
but to secure ‘the rights of St. Peter, the Pope’s safety,
and the exaltation of God’s Holy Church. He then
begged? the Pope’s permission to enter Rome that he
might pray in the different churches. The fact that
before Charlemagne entered the city oaths of mutual
good faith were given and taken by Charlemagne and
the Pope “is not less demonstrative of the fact that the

1 All direct from the Z. P. “Qua hora easdem sacratissimas
cruces ac signa... . conspexit, descendens de equo,” etc. This is
a proof, by the way, that Charlemagne practised the worship of images.
Cf. Hadrian’s own account of the reception of the Frankish king in
the metrical acrostic, which he prefixed to his collection of the canons
of Dionysius, which he presented to Charlemagne on this occasion,
ap. Duchesne, Z. P., 1. 516.

2 “ Obnixe deprecatus est isdem Rex .. . . Pontificem, illi licentiam
tribui Romam ingrediendi ad sua orationum vota . . . . persolvenda.
... Tam ipse Papa quam .... Rex... . seseque mutuo per
sacramentum munientes, ingressus est Romam.... ipse Rex cum
suis judicibus.” Z. P.

HADRIAN I. 409

Pope held the supreme power in Rome, and that his
sovereignty over the city was entirely independent of
the Frank kings, than it is of the perpetual apprehension
of violence and stratagem, which, in those ages of
barbarism and constantly-recurring invasion, kept men’s
minds on the alert, as in time of war.”’!

That same Saturday, and until the following Wednesday,
the minds and the time of the Pope and Charlemagne were
taken up with the different religious services in the great
basilicas. But on the last-mentioned day, Hadrian, with
his chief clergy and nobility, had a conference with
Charlemagne on secular affairs in St. Peter’s. As what
follows is of the first importance in connection with
the temporal power of the Pope, we will closely adhere
to the narrative in the Book of the Popes. Hadrian, we
are there told, begged Charlemagne to fulfil in every
particular the details of the donation (évomzssto) which
his father Pippin, as well as he himself and his brother
Carlomann, had made to Blessed Peter and to his vicar
Pope Stephen (II.) III., on the occasion of that Pope's
visit to the land of the Franks, This donation, continues
the papal biographer, involved “the concession? of various
cities and territories zz this province of Italy to Blessed
Peter and to his successors, to be possessed by them
for ever.’ When the said donation, which had been
drawn up at Kiersey (or Quiercy-sur-Oise) had been
read, Charlemagne ordered his chaplain and notary,
Etherius, to draw up another donation, “ke the former.
In it he granted the same cities and territories to Blessed

1 Miley’s Hist. of the Papal States, i. p. 277.

2 Rogavit ut promissionem “pro concedendis diversis civitatibus, ac
territoriis zstius provincie Italie et contradendis b. Petro ejusque
omnibus Vicariis in perpetuum possidendis, adimpleret in omnibus.”
Wh: Jeo

The dona-
tion of
Charle-
magne.

‘410 HADRIAN I.

Peter and the Pope, according to the description set forth
in the donation.

Before proceeding further with the narrative in the Lzder
Pontificalis, it is worth pausing to note that Hadrian’s
biographer, who was perfectly familiar with the actual deed
of donation, makes the gift of Charlemagne no more than
a confirmation of the original donation of Pippin to
Stephen III. at Kiersey.2 Strictly speaking, therefore,
Charlemagne did not augment his father’s gift. But his
donation was doubtless an increase of Azstudfs, with which
the popes had hitherto been contented. There seems never
to have been an attempt to enforce the ‘Kiersey treaty.’
To judge of this document by the ‘ donation of Charlemagne,’
which is represented as nothing more than its renewal, it
would seem that Pippin and his Franks had determined,
if need be, to limit the Lombards to the territory first
conquered and directly held by Alboin, their first king
who ruled in Italy. The other parts of Italy, which the
Lombards acquired later, or which were only imper-
fectly subject to the rule of their kings, such as the
duchies of Spoleto and Beneventum, were to have been

1 “Aliam donationis promissionem ad instar anterioris.... rex
ascribi jussit per Etherium;.... ubi concessit easdem civitates et
territoria b. Petro, easque Pontifici contradi spopondit per designa-
tionem confinium, sicut in eadem donatione continere monstratur: z.2.,
a Lunis cum insula Corsica, deinde in Suriano, deinde in monte
Bardone, inde in Verceto, deinde in Parma, deinde in Rhegio, et exinde
in Mantua atque monte Silicis, simulque et universum Exarchatum
Ravennatium, sicut antiquitus erat, atque provincias Venetiarum <et
Histriam necnon et cunctum Ducatum Spoletinum, et Beneventanum”
(zd.). Eginhard (22 uit. Car, c. 6) simply says that Charlemagne
“restored to the Romans all that had been forcibly taken from them.
... And all that had been seized by the Lombard kings was
restored to Hadrian, the rector of the Roman Church.” Azad. Petav.
(ap. M. G. SS., i.) say that after the fall of Pavia, Charlemagne
“lzetus S. Petro reddidit civitates quas debuit.”

2 Chi SUP. PP. 301, 312.

HADRIAN I, 411

handed over, by the terms of the Kiersey compact, to the
Pope. This clipping of the Lombards’ wings, by forming
a powerful state under the Pope all round them, had not
up to this time been put into effect. Aistulf’s donation
of the exarchate had been temporarily accepted. Now
that the Lombard kingdom was to be extinguished, it was
only natural that there should be a reversion to the original
deed of gift.

Charlemagne’s diploma, signed by him and his chief
men, both of Church and State, was placed in the con-
fession of St. Peter. A copy of the same deed, which they
had all sworn to observe, was taken away with them
by the Franks.t

By this donation of Charlemagne there were made over Extent of

to the popes, besides the full exarchate of Ravenna, the eae

. : Hons
duchies of Spoleto and Beneventum, the provinces of @PPin 4"?

Venetia and Istria, the island of Corsica, and, arguing from ™8"*
the towns mentioned, viz., Luna (Sarzana), Parma, Reggio,
etc., what, in addition to the exarchate, would make the
larger portion of modern Emilia. By the province of
Venetia would be meant that part on the mainland which
was subject to the Lombard sway.? Later writers, such
as Leo Ostiensis (eleventh century); Cardinal Deusdedit,
in his collection of canons (eleventh century) ; and Cencius
Camerarius® (£2. censuum), thirteenth century, all, from

WEBER

2 Cf. Jungmann, D7zs., xiv. § 75. Of this valuable dissertation we
have made no little use. The towns mentioned in the Z. P. are Luna
(Sarzana, near Spezia), Suriano (?); Monte Bardone, Bardi (?) ; Berceto
(some twenty-eight miles from Parma); Parma, Rheggio, Mantua, and
Monselice (a few miles from Padua). The northern boundary of the
papal territory was evidently a line from Luna to Monselice on the
frontier of the duchy of Venice. Cf Duchesne, Z. P., i. ccxxxvi. f.
If the Pope had ever come into actual possession of all the provinces
set down in this donation, he would have been lord of nearly two-thirds
of Italy. 3 Ap. Theiner, Cod. Dipi, 1. 2.

The auth-
enticity of
the dona-
tion is
called in
question.

The dona-
tion is
genuine,

412 HADRIAN I.

earlier documents, ¢,g., the Book of the Popes, describe the
donation in more or less the same terms.

The originals of these charters have unfortunately been
lost. And there are not wanting modern historians who
call in question, if not the fact that Charlemagne gave a
donation at all, at least that it had the extent that the
papal biographer gives it. These critics urge that it is
not Jikely that the Frank monarch would give such
extensive territory to the Holy See; and that, de facto,
dominion over many of the districts mentioned in the
donation was never held by the popes, nay, was not even
in the hands of Charlemagne, much less of Pippin, when
the donations were made.

That there are difficulties in the matter of these deeds
should not surprise us, when only abridgments of them
have come down to us. But the criterion for the authen-
ticity of ancient documents is not what certain modern
critics may or may not ‘¢hzxk lkely” Documents cannot
be rejected because there are obscurities connected with
them, or because their contents seem ‘unlikely’ to this or
that historian, but only on very solid grounds. And
certainly, with regard to the passage in the life of Hadrian
regarding the donation of Charlemagne, there is no more
real reason to doubt its authenticity than there is to doubt
of the passage in the life of Stephen (II.) II]. concerning
that of Charlemagne’s father Pippin. And if to disprove

the authenticity of the grant of Pippin it would be neces-

sary to disprove the authenticity of a great many other
accepted documents, notably of many of the letters of Pope
Paul in the Caroline Code, so also to disprove the grant of
Charlemagne it would be needful to show the unauthen-
ticity of many of the letters of Hadrian (or Leo III.) in the
same Code which seem to support the text in the Lzder
Pontificalis.

HADRIAN 1. 413

The territory—nearly two-thirds of Italy—which, accord-
ing to the text in the Book of the Popes, was made over
to the popes by the donations of Pippin and Charlemagne,
stretched as far to the south as did the boundaries of
the duchy of Beneventum, and in the north to a line drawn
from Sarzana (Luna, close to the Gulf of Spezzia) north-
wards along the river Magra, across the Apennines at the
Cisa Pass, touching Berceto, Parma, Reggio, Mantua, and
Monselice, and then turning so as to embrace Venetia and
Istria. To this tract of country must be added the isle
of Corsica.

Now, in the first place it is not denied that the popes
never actually held possession of all the country included
within the limits just named. But we shall proceed to
show that after the donation of Charlemagne, the extant
acknowledged authentic documents prove that the sovereign
pontiffs passed into actual possession, or at least proved
their right to so much of the territory marked out in the
donation, as given in the Lzber Pontzficalts, as to make it only
reasonable to suppose that that donation really represents
the gift of Charlemagne. The evidence which will be
adduced to establish this point will also go to furnish us
with a reason why the donation was never actually carried
out. The evidence will show us that the Frankish ruler
was not powerful enough to bring much of the territory
mentioned in the famous passage under his absolute sway.

One extract from a letter of Hadrian to Charlemagne
will suffice to make it plain that that king did make a
donation to Sz Peter, and that it was similar to that made
by his father. “ Deign,” writes! the Pope, “to accomplish
what your father and you yourself promised to Blessed

1 Cod C., 55 G. “Cuncta.... adimplere dignemini que .

tu ipse .... ea ipsa spondens confirmasti, eidemque apostolo
preesentialiter manibus tuis eamdem ohtulisti promissionem.”

AIA HADRIAN I.

Peter, and what afterwards, on the occasion of your visit
to the shrine of the Apostles, you yourself confirmed,
making the same donation to the same Apostle in your own
person and with your own hands.”

And to establish the fact that the donation involved a
grant of territory, and of regal jurisdiction over it, and not
merely of jpatrimonies, t.e., revenues or estates, it will be
enough to note that Hadrian often distinguishes in his
letters to Charlemagne between the latter’s gifts of patrz-
monies on the one hand and on the other of territory over
which he (the Pope) was to exercise sovereign powers.
And so on one occasion! Hadrian had to complain to
Charlemagne that, in connection with certain cities in the
Beneventan territory—de civitatibus partibus Beneventants
—the king’s missi would only hand over to him “the
bishops’ houses, monasteries and the public buildings (curtes
publicas), along with the keys of the cities, but not the
men. They are left free to come and go as they list.
And how can we hold the cities without the men, if their
inhabitants can plot against them? We desire, therefore, to
have full power over them and to rule and govern them as
we do in the case of the cities in Tuscany which you have
given us.” The difficulty of giving the exact sense of this

1 Cod. C., 84 G., 87 /. Cf. the close of 79 and 80 G., 7. 83 and 84.
In the metrical acrostic which forms the dedication of the Dionysian
collection of canons which Hadrian sent to Charlemagne, the Pope
writes among other things, distinguishing between cities or territories,
and rights or patrimonies :—

Reddidit (Carolus M.) prisca dona ecclesize matri su,
Urbesque magnas, fines simul et castra diversa .. . .
Exutus suffragiis almis spondebat lingua magistro
Genium servare sanctz ecclesize in avo Romane,
Justitias almi Petri sui protectoris tueri
. Habilem (?) ut super donans in ejus confessione libavit.
(Cited in full from Maassen (Quedlen, i. 965) by Duchesne, i. 516.) The

acrostic gives: Domino eccell. filio Carulo magno regi Hadrianus
papa.

HADRIAN L Ars

passage, though its general drift is clear enough, makes
one heartily wish that either Hadrian, his secretaries, or
their copyists had written clearer and better Latin.

There is further, we hold, solid reason to believe not
merely that Charlemagne made to Hadrian a donation,
but that the text under discussion in the Lzber Pontzjficalis
gives us the substance of that donation. To begin with,
one might be tempted to think that it was not likely
that the island of Corsica should be given to the popes.
And yet a letter of Pope Leo III. shows that the popes
did actually possess Corsica, and that, too, by virtue of
Charlemagne’s donation. For that his ‘donation might
remain intact, Leo III. ‘entrusts the affairs of Corsica’!
to the king.

Then, too, no matter how unlikely it may seem that
the duchy of Spoleto should be granted to the bishops
of Rome, there can be no doubt that it was included in
the grant. For Hadrian could confidently write to his
royal friend: “ Moreover,” you yourself in your own person,
through our Insignificance, offered to Blessed Peter, your
protector, the duchy of Spoleto for the welfare of your
soul.” Nor need we remind the reader that the Spoletans
had already placed themselves under the Pope, and that, in
testimony thereof, their duke, Hildeprand, who had sworn

1 Ep. 1,ed. Hampe, /. 1. “De insula Corsica, unde et in scriptis et
per missos vestros nobis emisistis, in vestrum arbitrium et dispositum
committimus. Atque in ore posuimus Helmengandi comitis: ut
vestra donatio semper firma et stabilis permaneat.” Cf one of the
lives of Sergius II. (844-847), c. 44, ap. Duchesne, LZ. P., li. 99, where
a certain Count Adelvert is spoken of as governor of Corsica for the
Pope.

256 G., J. 57. “Quia et ipsum Spoletinum ducatum vos pre-
sentaliter offeruistis protectori vestro b. Petro princ. app. per nostram
mediocritatem pro anime: vestree mercaede (szc).” Cf. the spontaneous
surrender of themselves by the people of Spoleto to the Franks under
Stephen (II.) III., and to Pope Hadrian, just related.

‘416 HADRIAN 1.

allegiance to the Pope, dated his documents! “in the
times of the thrice blessed and angelic lord, Hadrian,
pontiff and universal Pope.”

But what of Lombard Tuscany, ze, the country between
Luna and the boundary of the duchy of Rome? Well,
again the letters of Hadrian to Charlemagne show that
at least half of it was sooner or later in the hands of that
pontiff. For not only does he mention as his the southern
towns of Suana, Tuscana (Tuscanella), Viterbo and
Balneoregis (Bagnorea), etc., but others as far as Rosellae,
Populonium and Castrum Felicitatis?; unless, indeed, in
the case of Populonium and Rosellae there was not merely
question of patrimonies.

However, whether or not Hadrian ever possessed the
whole of Lombard Tuscany, it is certain, at any rate, that
he never held the whole of the duchy of Beneventum.
But that does not make it certain that it was never given
to him. On the contrary, we know, on the one hand,
that he actually did become the lord of a part of it?; and,
on the other hand, a fragment * of a report of Charlemagne’s
muisst (envoys), which has come down to us, shows that
the authority of the Frankish monarch was not strong
enough there to enable him to put Hadrian in possession
of the duchy. Besides, it is the less wonderful that
Beneventum should have been included in the donation,

1 Regist. Farf., c. (91), ap. Hodgkin, Z¢aly, viii. 29.

2 Cf. epp. 79-80, and 58 G. “ Partibus Tuscize civitates, z.e., Suana,
Tuscana, Bitervo et Balneoregis ceterasque civitates cum finibus et
territoriis eorum, b. Petro offerentes condonastis.” Ep. 80.

3 Epp. 79-82, and 84 G.

4 With the letter of his envoy Maginarius to Charlemagne (ap. Jaffé,
Mon. Car., p. 246), compare that of Hadrian to the envoy, 70., 345.
Annalists assure us that Beneventum was given to the Pope. Cf Ann.
Juv. Min. ap. M. G. SS.,i. p. 88; and the Ann. Maximiniantz, 7b.,
xiii, ad an. 787, “Carolus Romam venit et Beneventum S. Petro
reddidit.”

HADRIAN tf. Aly

when it is remembered that the Beneventans had com-
mended themselves to Pippin through Pope Stephen!
GE Ti

Finally, there is a passage in a letter of Stephen (III.)
IV. (768-772) to John of Grado, which would seem to
allude to the donation of Pippin (and hence to that of
Charlemagne, which does but confirm that of his father),
and to the conferring of power on the Pope over even
Istria and Venetia. “In the general treaty (pactum
generale) which was drawn up between the Romans,
Franks and Lombards,” writes the Pope, “your province
of Istria and that of Venetia were included. Hence let
your holiness trust in God, that as the mex (fideles) of
Blessed Peter engaged on oath to be true to the interests
of the Prince of the Apostles and to his vicars, who will
sit in this See to the end of time, they also engaged in
writing ever to defend your province from the oppression
of enemies, just as this our province of the Romans and
the exarchate of Ravenna.”? The import of the passage
is certainly not too clear, nor do I know whether it
refers to the marriage treaty of 770 arranged between
Charlemagne and Desiderius by Bertrada, or to some

1 Cod. C.,11 G. “Et tam ipsi Spolitini quamque etiam Beneventani
omnes se commendare fer mos... . excellentize tuze cupiunt.”

2 Ap. WZ. G. Epp,, iii. p. 715. “In nostro pacto generali, quod inter
Romanos, Francos et Longobardos dignosciter provenisse, et ipsa
vestra Istriarum provincia constat esse confirmata atque annexa
simulque et Venetiarum provincia. Ideo confidat in Deo sanctitas
tua quia ita fideles b. Petri studuerunt ad serviendum jurejurando b.
Petro App. Principi et ejus omnibus vicariis . . . . in scriptis
contulerunt promissionem, ut sicut hanc nostram Rom. provinciam
et exarchatum Ravennatium et ipsam quoque vestram provinciam pari
modo ab inimicorum oppressionibus semper defendere procurent.”
And yet, doubtless by their hold of the cities on the coast, the
Byzantines had considerable influence in Istria. Cf Cod. C., ep. 63
G.—written between 776-780—concerning the collection of ‘ pensiones

B. Petri’ in Istria.
VOL. I, PT. IL. a7

“Ars HADRIAN I.

other. But as Stephen IV. quotes the example of his
predecessor Stephen (II.) IIL.’s interest in Istria, it would
appear that rights over it conceded to Stephen III. were
asserted by Stephen IV.

In a period when the records of history are as scant as
they are at the close of the eighth century, it would be
difficult to find an historical text better supported by
supplementary documents than is the donation passage in
the biography of Hadrian I.

With evidence, then, such as this before us, we can-
not doubt that Charlemagne, by a _ fresh donation,
confirmed that of his father, and that both donations
included other territories besides that of the exarchate,
viz., those mentioned in the disputed text. On the other
hand, it is also certain, as has been said, that those
additional territories did not all come under the power
of the popes immediately after they had been granted
to them. And, in fact, dominion over some of them,
such as Istria, etc. was never acquired by the popes
at all. This is to be accounted for to some extent by
the fact that both Pippin and Charlemagne promised
to give that of which they were not actually possessed.
And when Charlemagne afterwards obtained more or
less complete control over the whole of the districts
enumerated in his donation, one cause and another—
perhaps a certain unwillingness to part with what he
had won only with considerable cost; but certainly,
still more, because his hold on some of the conquered
provinces was not too firm—stood in the way of his
fully carrying his donation to completion. And though
it is no part of the duty of the defenders of the authenticity
of the donation text to be able to state why a promise
made was not kept, it may be suggested, with Duchesne,
that Charlemagne’s promise of 774 was, with the consent

HADRIAN I, 419

of the Pope, restricted as useless and incapable of fulfil-
ment on the occasion of the king’s visit to Rome in 781.
And if the popes never had full jurisdiction over all the
lands named in the donation,! they certainly received fresh
rights over them and additional revenues from them. And
by the end of the year 787, Pope Hadrian was the actual
ruler not only of the duchy of Rome and the exarchate,
but also of various cities in Lombard Tuscany, as Suana
(Sovana), Tuscana (Toscanella), Viterbo, etc., and in the
duchy of Beneventum, as Sora, Arpinum, Aquino, Capua,
etc?

Hitherto in connection with our account of the dona- ee
tions of Pippin and Charlemagne no mention has been ment.’
made of the famous so-called ‘Fantuzzian Fragment.’
In the year 1500 the Venetian Government made a
collection ® of some 270 of the more important documents
which concerned their relations with various popes and
princes. The original collection is now lost. Two faulty
copies of it, however, still exist. From one of these
Fantuzzi* published the ‘fragment’ which bears his name.
The document purports to give a detailed account of
the transactions between Pippin and Stephen (II.) IIL,

1 On the abstract justice of Charlemagne’s donation, cf Alzog,
Church Fist. ii. 107 n.

2 Consult map 63 and the letterpress thereto, by Professor Bury, in
the Historical Atlas of Modern Europe, Oxford, 1897f. There
Professor Bury gives the following dates to the additions to the
donation of Aistulf: 757, Desiderius surrenders to the Pope Faenza,
Imola, Ferrara, Cabellum, Tiberiacum (Bagnacavallo). After 759,
the territory of Bologna in the N.; Ancona, Osimo, Umana in the
S.; and Castrum Felicitatis ; c. 781, under Charlemagne, the Sabinian
territory; c¢. 787, Populonium and Rosellz (Grosseto), Suana and
other Tuscan towns, and Capua, Sora, etc., were acquired.

3 The collection was entitled “ Serves Litterarum, privil. et pactorum
Pontif., Inperat., et altorum Princip. ad Venetorum ducatum et
eccles. spect. ab an. 700 ¢. usgue ad 1400.”

4 Monumenti Ravennatt. The fragment is in vol. vi. p. 264 f.

“420 HADRIAN L

at Quiercy. It begins by asserting that, bitterly oppressed
by the Lombards, Stephen asked and obtained leave of
the Greek emperor to apply to the Franks for aid. It then
states that, with the consent of all his chief men, Pippin
undertook, if God should grant him to become conqueror
of the Lombards, to bestow for the good of his soul on
Blessed Peter, the ‘keybearer of the heavenly kingdom,’ and
on the Pope, his vicar, Corsica! and the other territories,
already mentioned from the Book of the Popes. To which,
in this fragment, Naples seems to be added.?

The writer of this document, from his mention of the
emperor Leo IV., would seem to have lived at the close
of the eighth century.

This document has had its authenticity as stoutly
attacked as defended. Without going into the pros
and cons of the matter, we may sum up the pros with
Jungmann.? “The style of the fragment, with its barbarous
Latinity, points to its origin in Lombard times. The
accuracy of various minute details given in the document,
and the way in which it squares with the lives of Stephen
III.and Hadrian, as we know them in the Lzber Pontificalis,
are enough to show the fragment is really authentic.”
Were it so, it would, of course, afford a strong confirmation
of what we have already said with regard to the extent
of Charlemagne’s donation.

But no great weight can be attached to a document
concerning which there are coms not a few, and which

1 “ Tibi, tuisque Vicariis sub omni integritate aeternaliter concedimus,
nullam nobis nostrisque successoribus infra ipsas terminationes
potestatem reservatam Corsicam,” etc. (Frag. Fant.)

2 “Et si idem Dominus Deus nobis Beneventum et Neapolim
subdere dignatus fuerit, integriter tibi, b. Petre, omnia preelata loca
concedimus, 7z.¢., Emiliam,” etc. (2d.). In the reénumeration of the
places neither Beneventum nor Naples is mentioned.

3 Diss., xiv. § 80.

HADRIAN I. 421

is regarded as spurious by many distinguished scholars.
In the first place, the Mragment, which is drawn up as
though it proceeded from Pippin, is addressed to Pope
Gregory! “Pippinus ... . Gregorio apostolica sublimitate
fulgenti.” But both before and after that expression there
is always question of Pope Szephen,' so that the introduc-
tion of ‘Gregory’ cannot be said to tell seriously against
the authenticity of the document. Then Stephen is
represented as asking, not Constantine Copronymus, who
was the emperor during his reign, but Leo (IV.) to allow
him to turn to the Franks for aid against the Lombards,
Here again there is an answer. It is pointed out that,
as early as the year 751, Leo was associated with his
father in the Empire. And if, as is supposed by various
authors, the fragment was composed during the sole reign
of Leo IV. (775-780), there is obvious reason why his was
the name selected for mention. The greatest difficulty
in the way of allowing the genuineness of the document
seems to be that the emperor of Constantinople is
represented as authorising the appeal of the Pope to
the Franks for their support and patronage against the
Lombards. But even this seems far from an insuperable
objection. To play off one foe against another was a
very common policy of the rulers of Constantinople,
especially from the days of Justinian; and, it may
well have been thought at this time in the capital of
the Empire, that, if the Franks broke the power of the
Lombards and gave most of their territory to the popes,
the latter would prove a foe which could be much more
easily overcome by the imperial troops than the fierce

1 Hence the document is entitled, “ Pactum sive promissio facta per
Pipinum patricium Stephano secundo pontifici”; and its narrative
always speaks of Pope Stephen. ‘Gregory’ may well, therefore, be
supposed to be an error of transcription.

Charle-
magne’s

donation.

‘422 HADRIAN I.

Lombard. Hence their ready consent to the Pope’s
request. As nothing depends upon the authenticity
of this document of Fantuzzi, we may be pardoned for
referring the reader elsewhere for further information
with regard to it.

It would be neither possible nor desirable to gigeuse
here all the different theories that have, on more or less
strong grounds, been broached in connection with this
donation. But in concluding our remarks on this subject,
it may be useful to call attention to the truth that the
dominion of a sovereign prince over a country does not
necessarily imply his personal ownership of it, nor, vce
versa, does ownership of a district imply supreme rule
over it, but that in practice the overlord will probably
possess more or less of the land of which he is the suzerain.
And so it would not result, as a matter of course, that the
popes were the supreme rulers of the districts where the
‘patrimonies’ of the Roman Church were situated ; nor, on
the other hand, because we find patrimonies in certain
regions being given to them, would it follow that they
were or were not already supreme rulers of those regions;
The patrimonies were, so to speak, the State property, the
‘crown lands’ of the Roman Church and the popes. They
were the private property of the Roman See, and were
situated both where the said See had supreme dominion
and where it had not. Charlemagne then, it would seem,

1 Hodgkin, /zaly, vii. 224f.; Jungmann, Déss. in Hist. E., D. 14.
It should be stated that the fragment adds that over the territories
granted ‘no power was reserved’ for Pippin and his successors, but
that they were to have a share in the Pope’s prayers, and be called by
him and his people ‘Patricians of the Romans.’ The donation of
Beneventum and Naples was expressly stated to be conditional on
their conquest by Pippin. But Emilia, Pentapolis, both the Tuscanies,
the duchies of Perugia and Spoleto, the island of Corsica, the duchy
of the Venetias and Istria, and the exarchate were conceded in their
entirety.

HADRIAN I. 423

to all practical purposes zzcreased both the private property
of the Church, ze. its patrimonies at least, by restoring in
various districts its ‘rights’ (ustiti@), which the Lombards
had usurped, and its dominion} by rendering real a control
which in some localities had, up to this date, existed only
in a sealed parchment.

After he left Rome, Charlemagne returned to Pavia, which
was forced to surrender unconditionally (June 774). De-
siderius and his wife were taken by Charlemagne with him ?
into France,where Desiderius is said to have died a holy death
in the monastery of Corbie. And thus, in the words of an
ancient writer?: “ Here was finished the kingdom of the
Langobardi, and began the kingdom of Italy, by the most
glorious Charles, king of the Franks, who, as helper and
defender of lord Peter, the prince of the Apostles, had gone
to demand justice for him from Italy. For no desire of
gain caused him to wander.” After he had, as king of the
Lombards, received the homage of the chief men of the
conquered country, and placed garrisons in Pavia and a
few of the frontier cities, Charlemagne returned to France.4

1 With this squares very well a passage in Hadrian’s letter to
Constantine and Irene, read in the second session of the Seventh
General Council. Carolus Rex, b. Petro, “perpetuo obtulit possidenda
(1) tam provincias, quam civitates seu castra et cetera territoria, (2) imo
et patrimonia, que a perfida Langobardorum gente detinebantur.”

22. P.; Ann. S. Amand.; Lamb.; Petav., etc, ad an. 774, ap
M.G.SS.,i. Annal. Vet. Franc. “Langobardi de singulis civitatibus
Italize subdiderunt se dominio et regimini gloriosi regis Caroli.” Cf
also Annal. Lauriss. ad an. 744; Ann. Sangal. Maj.

3 Cf.an introduction to a MS. of the Lombard Laws of Rotharis,
preserved in the ducal library of Gotha, and hence known as the
Codex Gothanus. It was probably written about 807-810, (Quoted
by Dr. Hodgkin, /faly, etc., v. 149.) We would ask the reader to
observe that in this document also, Charlemagne is the ‘helper,
not ‘lord’ of the Pope. The codex is printed, ap. JZ. G. SS. Langod.,

mot
: 4 There is no need to discuss the synod in which, according to
Sigebert (who wrote about 1112), in his Chronicle (ad an. 773), the

Fall of
Pavia, 774.

Usurpation
of the

Archbishop
of Ravenna,

774

424. HADRIAN I.

Except that he had an overlord of a different nationality,
the Lombard was left by Charlemagne wellnigh as free as
he found him. But, after an inglorious existence of over
two hundred years, inglorious in peace, for it produced no
great man, and in war, for it never subdued all Italy, the
kingdom of the Lombard now passed away for ever from
before the eyes of the popes—another of the many kingdoms
which the undying line of the Roman pontiffs has seen born
and die! In the South of Italy, however, the dukes of
Beneventum, who from this time forth assumed the title
of prince, and whose territory comprised perhaps most of
what was afterwards the kingdom of Naples, preserved more
or less of independence for their Lombard countrymen.

No sooner had Charlemagne left Italy than Hadrian was
beset by political difficulties of all kinds. Difficulties
incidental to the establishment of a new order of things ;
difficulties from within and difficulties from without.
Hadrian’s first trouble after the departure of Charlemagne
was from those ‘of his own household.’ We have seen Leo
of Ravenna acting independently of the Pope in the affair
of Paul Afiarta. Power must have proved sweet to him.
No sooner had Charlemagne crossed the Alps than the
archbishop seized various cities of Emilia, expelled the
papal officials and appointed his own, and tempted the
loyalty of the citizens of the Pentapolis. But these latter
remained firm in their allegiance to Hadrian, as they had
done to Stephen (IJ.) III, “to whom,” writes! the Pope to

Pope gave Charlemagne the right of choosing the Pope and of
investing all the bishops throughout his dominions! The synod is a
proved ‘fiction.’ Cf Gregorovius, Rome, etc., ii. 371 n.; Sandini,
Disputat. Hist. xix. Indeed, it is said not to have been mentioned
even in the original edition of Sigebert. (Ci Azst. des Conciles,
De Saucliéres, ili. No. 687.)

1 All this from Cod. Carol., 49 G. “Cui (Stephano)... . genitor
tuus et... . excellentia tua ipsum exarchatum sub jure b. Petri

HADRIAN I. 425

Charlemagne, “your father and yourself gave the exarchate.
... And so the enemies of both of us are now striving
to take away from us the power we exercised even in
Lombard times.” To gain over the Frank monarch to
his side, Leo betook himself to Francia. He, however,
obtained no satisfaction from Charlemagne, who assured
the Pope that he would see that his donation was carried
into effect.1 But, convinced that the Frankish king was
too occupied with the Saxons (against whom Charlemagne
had to be in arms off and on from 773-804) to be able to
interfere with him, Leo, on his return from /rancia, gave
out that the cities of Imola and Bologna had been given
to him and not to the Pope, and continued to act as
before.?

So that, for instance, when the Pope sent his treasurer
Gregory to the aforesaid cities to bring thence to him
their magistrates, and to receive the oaths of fidelity
from all the people, Leo would not suffer the Pope’s
functionary to approach the cities. In like manner, when,
by a formal official document,? Hadrian had appointed a
certain Dominicus count of the little city of Gabellum,
the rebellious archbishop sent a body of troops to seize the
new count. This they did, and at the time (November
775) when the Pope wrote the letter which furnishes us
with all these particulars, Dominicus was a prisoner at
Ravenna.

Disloyal to the Pope, Leo, not unnaturally, seems to
have been disloyal to Charlemagne also. He doubtless

permanendum tradidit.”. This refers, of course, to the donation at
Quiercy (754).

1 Cod. C., 53 G.; ed. Migne, also 53, written in 775.

2 Cod. C54 G. But the Pope has full confidence that Charlemagne
will endeavour to fulfil “omnia que b. Petro per vestram donationem
offerenda promisistis.”

3 Ep. 55 G., 56/7. “ Preeceptum ejusdem civitatis illi tribuentes,”

426 HADRIAN I.

realised that when the Frankish king had a free hand
he would have to render him an account of his rebellious
conduct towards the Pope. Accordingly he seems to
have lent his support to those who were desirous of
ousting the Franks from Italy. At any rate this is the
conclusion that, in common with Hadrian, we draw from
the action of Leo, narrated by the Pope to Charlemagne
in a letter! of October 27, 775. Hadrian had received a
most important letter from John, the patriarch of Grado—
so important that neither Hadrian himself nor his secretary
ate or drank till they had sent it off to Charlemagne along
with a letter from the Pope. This document of John,
which, with great probability, has been supposed to have
had reference to the rebellion of Rodgausus (Hrodgaud)
of Friuli, which broke out a month or two after this, had
been confiscated on its way through Ravenna by Leo,
The archbishop broke the seals, made himself acquainted
with the contents of the letter, and only then sent it on
to Hadrian. Fully warranted by the circumstances seems
the conclusion of the Pope—that Leo communicated the
intelligence he had acquired by his arbitrary conduct
“to Arichis, Duke of Beneventum, and to the rest of our
and your enemies.”

How many troubles would have been spared the popes
if they could have made up their minds centuries earlier
than they did to govern their dominions in a less paternal
but more practical manner. If the people of our own
century and country even require sometimes to be kept
in order, how much more did the still semi-barbarian races
which were in possession of Europe in the eighth century.

However, as after this? Hadrian never again alludes

154 G, 55 /. “Sifoniatas (turbatas) bullas ejusdem epistola

repperimus ; a Leone primitus relecta, nobis directa est.”
2 Cf. Muratori, ad an. 777 ; and ep. 94 /., 86 G,

HADRIAN I, 427

to any difficulties with Leo, we may conclude that
Charlemagne’s ambassadors, whom the Pope was then
expecting, restored his rule in the exarchate and Emilia.
These same ambassadors, Bishop Possessor and Abbot
Radigaud, caused Hadrian no little anxiety, not merely
because they did not arrive when he expected them, but
because, “when they reached Perugia, instead of continuing
their journey hither, as your excellency (Charlemagne)
had ordered them, and as we gathered they would from
your letters, setting us at naught, they directed their
steps to Duke Hildeprand at Spoleto, and sent word to
us by our missi that when they had had some converse
with Hildeprand they would, according to their orders,
join them (Hadrian’s envoys) at our palace.” Then, what
was worse, despite the Pope’s urgent request that they
would come to him at least before they went to
Beneventum, they again made no account of his wishes
but went immediately from Spoleto to Beneventum,
thereby, as Hadrian imagined, disgracing him and unduly
elating the Spoletans. His apprehensions were, however,
entirely groundless. The king’s missi had not been
unfaithful to their sovereign’s directions: still less had
Charles himself been unmindful of the Pope’s interests.
This Hadrian discovered when the missi, at the close of
the year (775), had at length presented themselves to
him: “ We beg to inform your excellency concerning your
most faithful mzssz, that (as we had already discovered and
had by letter notified your royal power), when they had
been presented to us, we found them true to your patron,
St. Peter, as well as to us and to you. Hence we beg

you receive them well.”?

Next year (776) Hadrian had to ask Charlemagne pee

1 Epp. 57 and 59 /., 56and 52 G. The chronology of Jaffé and not ete.
of Gundlach is here followed,

428 HADRIAN I,

to remove from Tuscany Reginald, Duke of Clusium
(Chiusi), for invading ‘our city+ Castellum Felicitatis,
which is generally supposed to be the same as the ancient
Tifernum, destroyed by Totila, and the modern Citta di
Castello, close to the left bank of the Tiber near its
sources.

In the early part of this same year (776) Hadrian was
brought face to face with a serious danger. Arichis,
duke or prince of Beneventum, naturally full of Lombard
sympathies, put himself at the head of a movement, the
aim of which was to restore the Lombard supremacy
in Italy. A conspiracy was formed between himself,
Hildeprand, Duke of Spoleto (who was anxious to escape
from any real subjection to Pope or Frank), Rodgausus
(Hrodgaud), Duke of Friuli, and Reginald of Clusium,
to combine in the March of 776 or 777 with Adalgis or
Athalgisis, the son of Desiderius, who was expected then
to land in Italy with a Greek force from Constantinople
(whither he had fled on the fall of the Lombard kingdom),
and to restore the said kingdom.? For the time being,
the marvellous activity of Charlemagne dealt the con-
spiracy a serious blow. He swooped down upon Friuli,
and Rodgausus had lost both his duchy® and his life
before the Easter of this very year (776).

Throughout the greater portion of his reign Hadrian
had ever to be on the watch against the intrigues of
the Lombards. As long as Arichis remained unsubdued,
it was only to be expected that the Lombards would
rally round him and strive to regain their supremacy in

* Cod. C.,58 G. “In eamdem civitatem zostram Castelli Felicitatis
properans.”

= 1D BGs (Gear OIes

3 Annal. Fuld. ad ann. 775-6; Ann. Francor. and Lauriss., 776
Cf. James, fist. of Charlemagne, p. 201,

HADRIAN I, 429

Italy. But in Hadrian they met their match. His un-
tiring watchfulness frustrated their plans. Charlemagne
was kept well informed of their doings, and before they
were completely matured they were invariably crushed by
that equally unwearied and strong sovereign. Again,
another powerful combination was formed in_ Italy.
What made these designs all the more formidable was
the fact that they had the support of Tassilo, Duke of
Bavaria, who, like Arichis, had married a daughter of
Desiderius. The Beneventans formed an alliance! with
the Greeks of Terracina and Gaeta, where the patrician
of Sicily was then residing, with the immediate object
of subjecting certain of the papal cities of Campania to
the Patricius (777). But a force sent by Hadrian checked
their plots by the capture of Terracina. The effect of
this was to make the Greeks at first wishful for peace;
but, backed up by Arichis, who was daily expecting
Adalgis from Constantinople with a Greek army, and
aided by the Neapolitans, they recovered Terracina (780).
In informing * Charlemagne of these occurrences, Hadrian
assures him that he asks his aid not on account of the
loss of Terracina, but lest the Beneventans should suc-
ceed in throwing off the Frankish yoke altogether. Con- Second

coming to

vinced of the magnitude of the danger, Charlemagne Romeo}
arle-

again set out for Rome, taking with him his wife and anegiie
781.

two of his sons. One of these, Carlomann, the Pope
baptised, giving him the name of Pippin. Both of them
he anointed as kings. Pippin was named king of Italy,
and Louis, king of Aquitaine® By the joint exertions

1“ Asnoscat .... preecellentia vestra, quia aliquantas civitates
nostras Campaniz operantes zemuli vestri atque nostri, nefandissimi
Beneventani, ipsi ostro populo persuadentes subtrahere a mostra
ditione decertant,” etc. Ep. 61 G. 2 Cod. C., 64 G.

3 Annal. Vet. Franc.,ad an. 781 ; Annal. Lauresh., and other annals,
The Astronomer, in his life of Louis (c. 4), says that Charlemagne

Diplomatic
minutes,
785;

“430 HADRIAN I.

of ambassadors from the Pope and Charlemagne, Tassilo
submitted! The difficulty with the Greeks seemed to
be put in a fair way to being finally settled, as, in
consequence of a request from Irene, who was now
ruling in the East, Charlemagne’s daughter was espoused
to the empress’s young son (781).? Trusting that a
peace of permanent duration had now been secured,
Charlemagne again set out for France, after having put
the Pope in actual possession of the Sabine territory—
viz., the territory about Rieti.

Apart from the letters between Hadrian and Charle-
magne regarding the Sabine territory, very little of their
correspondence between the years 781-6 has come down
to us. A curious fragment, however, of the king’s in-
structions to his mzssz, as to how they should behave
towards the Pope, has escaped the destroying hand of
time, and belongs to this interval.

The ambassadors are told to begin by offering to the
Pope the respects of his son King Charles, of his daughter
Fastrada, ‘our queen, of all his family, and the whole
nation of the Franks. The Pope is to be thanked for
informing the king of his health. For the king is happy
when he hears of the safety of the Pope or of ‘ your people.’
thought it would be a great gain if he and his children got the royal
insignia from the Vicar of the Apostles. Louis was then avery small
child, “cunarum adhuc utens gestatorio.” It is interesting to note
that a certain Godescalcus was at this time finishing a copy of the
Gospels which he had undertaken at Charlemagne’s orders, and that
in a few verses (ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 98, p. 1353) he has noted these
events : the king’s journey, “ Ut Petrum sedemque Petri rex cerneret,”
Carlomann’s baptism, etc.

1 Eginhard, Ammal., ad an. 781.

2 Annal. Vet. Franc., ib., etc. ; Theoph. 2% Chron., ad an. 774.

8 On the negotiations regarding the cession of the Sabine territory

and on the oaths of the old men that the Sabine patrimony had of old

belonged to the Holy See (ep. 69 G.), cf epp. 68-73 G., ann. 781-2.
4 Ap. Jaffé, Cod. C., p. 341.

HADRIAN I. 431

Hadrian is also to be thanked for his holy prayers, for
which the king would be glad to make a suitable return.
Through these same prayers and the mercy of God, the
king and all his are well. |

When the king’s letter is presented to the Pope, the
misst are to ask his gracious reception of it, and of the
presents—such as Charlemagne could get in Saxony—
which they are to show to Hadrian at his good pleasure.
More valuable presents will be sent as soon as procurable.

For some years, indeed, there was peace in S. Italy,
but in 786 the restless Arichis, for some cause or other
at war with the Greeks, received a defeat! from the
Neapolitans when attacking one of their cities (Amalfi).
But mutual dread and dislike of Charlemagne once
more united these enemies. The unfaithful Tassilo was
again induced to join against the common foe, and he
in turn endeavoured to secure the aid of the barbarian
hordes on his frontier. The breaking off of the engage-
ment between Rotruda and-the young Constantine was
followed by a hearty co-operation of the ambitious Irene
in the alliance against the Frank monarch (787).

But, as before, Charlemagne was at Rome in the very
centre of his enemies before their schemes were ripe.
After careful deliberation with the Pope? and with the
Frank leaders, it was decided to commence operations
by crushing Arichis. When the duke heard that the
dreaded Frank was already at Capua, he sent to offer
his submission; and, as evidence of it, his sons as
hostages, and money. Charlemagne, “having more® re-
gard for what was for the welfare of the people than
for the man’s obstinacy, granted his request, accepted

1 Cod. C., 78 G. 2 Eginhard, Aznal.

8 Eginhard, zm vit. Car, c. 10; of. Ann. Pet.; and a fragment of
Ann. Chesnit, ap. Pertz, M. G. SS., i.

Fresh
disturb-
ances in S.
Italy, 786,

Third visit
of Charle-
magne to
Rome, 787.

432 HADRIAN L

the hostages he had sent; and for a large sum of
money excused him from personal attendance. Only
the younger son (Grimwald) was detained as a hostage.
The elder (Romuald) was sent back to his father.”
Charlemagne next turned his attention to Tassilo. That
faithless prince, to gain time, sent ambassadors to induce
the Pope to act as mediator between his offended suzerain
and himself. Hadrian had no difficulty in soothing
Charlemagne’s anger against Tassilo, But when the
Pope discovered that he was simply being made a tool of,
he sent to let the Bavarian know that he would ex-
communicate him if, after all the promises he (Tassilo)
had made, he did not submit; and that he would throw
on him all the guilt of the spilling of Christian blood
which obstinate perseverance in rebellion on his part
would cause. This further introduction? of excommuni-
cation as a factor in politics is noteworthy. Tassilo, a
Catholic prince, had been guilty of perjury and calling
in to his aid pagan barbarians, a course of action
most inimical to the welfare of Christendom. As the
recognised Head of the Church, which all Christendom
then believed that they were bound to ‘hear, Hadrian
had a right to judge of the public crimes of Christian
princes. ‘Excommunication’ was the natural punish-
ment to be inflicted on Catholics obstinately guilty of
grave offences against the Church. But since, as yet, by
the public law of Christendom, no tangible temporal
penalties were attached to excommunication, the threat
of it would have fallen to no purpose on the ears of
Tassilo, had they not soon after heard the clang of the
approach of Charlemagne’s army. Then, again, he was
all submission. And once again, on his giving hostages,

1 Cf. sup. p. 404.

HADRIAN 1. 433

was he pardoned by the magnanimous Frank (October
787).1

Kindness was, however, thrown away on both Arichis
and Tassilo.2_ Both were soon again plotting against the
rule of their generous enemy. The rapidity of Charle-
magne’s movements in 787 had anticipated the arrival
of any assistance for them from Constantinople. But
Adalgis had never ceased labouring to get a Greek force
with which to make an attempt to recover his father’s
throne. At length word was sent to the allies that he had
obtained his end and was setting sail with a considerable
force from Constantinople (788). He landed in Calabria,
as the foe of Italy was then® called, to find that Arichis
(+787) and his eldest son, Romuald, were dead. At the
request of the Beneventans, but against the advice of
Hadrian,* whose advice was justified not by the immediate
acts of Grimwald but by his later, Charlemagne had sent
back® Grimwald to be the new duke of Beneventum. To
begin with, Grimwald was faithful and co-operated with
Charlemagne’s generals. For on this occasion, though he

1 Cf Egin., 2m vit. Car.,c. 11; Annal. Lauris., ad an. 787, and other

annals, ap. Pertz, 17. G. SS., i.; James, Charlemagne, p. 309 ; Muratori,
Annal., ad an. 787.

2 Cod. C., 83 G. “Arichis ....ad imperatorem emisit missos,
petens auxilium et honorem patriciatus .... promittens ei tam in
tonsura quam in vestibus usu Greecorum perfrui sub ejusdem
imperatoris ditione. . .. Imperator autem emisit illi spatarios duos
.... ferentes secum vestes auro textas, simul et spatam, vel pectinze
et forcipes patricium eum constituendi.” This passage is interesting
as showing not only the special robes, etc., used in investing a
patrician, but also that foreigners, on whom the honour of the patriciate
was conferred, conformed even to the Greek mode of dressing the
hair. Cf Erchempert, West. Lang., c. 4, ap. M. G. SS. Langob.

3 Apparently in the latter half of the preceding century the Greeks
transferred the name to the /oe of Italy.

4 Cod. C., 80 G.

5 Erchempert (born about 881), fist. Longod., c. 4 (ap. Migne,
EN tat2G):

VOL.AL PT. If. 28

434 HADRIAN 1,

struck in again before his opponents were ready, Charle-
magne himself did not go into Italy, but turned his atten-
tion to the more formidable danger and summoned Tassilo
tohim. Not powerful enough to disobey, Tassilo came, was
condemned, and confined to a monastery. His dukedom
was divided among various Frank counts (788).

In Italy, supported by the dukes of Beneventum and
Spoleto, Charlemagne’s troops were completely victorious
over the Greeks about the middle of 788; and Adalgis
is said by some to have died on the field of battle.
“Legend has enshrined the memory of this champion
of Lombard independence.”? This conflict practically
put an end to Hadrian’s troubles and fears from Lombard
intrigue, and enabled him to pass the remainder of his
days in comparative quiet.

eee However, before leaving the subject of Italian intrigues,

cerning _ for the purpose of showing more at large into what details

Capua and - Bric
other Bene- of Italian politics the letters of Hadrian give us a

vent 2 . .
towns: view, it may be worth while to draw out from that source
-8. ere
fe) the account therein given of the negotiations connected
with the surrender of Capua to the popes. That the
story will be incomplete will only prove that it depends
upon the Caroline Code.

Towards the close of the year 787 Charlemagne sent
two embassies into Italy to arrange about the succession
to the duchy of Beneventum (owing to the death of its
duke Arichis and his eldest son in the summer) and the
surrender to Hadrian of certain cities in the Beneventan
territory. The deacon Atto, and Goteramnus, ‘the mag-

1 Eginhard, zz Vit. Car.,c. 11; and Ammal. ad an. 788. Cf also
Annal. Lauriss., Tilliant, Nazar., etc., ap. M. G. SS., i.

2 Hist. Gen., by Lavisse and Rambaud, i. 315. Cf. James’ Life of
Charlemagne, 324.

3 “Civitates partibus Beneventanis, sicut eas per vestram sacram
oblationem b. Petro et nobis contulistis.” Ep. 80 G., 84 7. “Capua

HADRIAN I. 435

nificent Gate-keeper, belonged to the first embassy. The
second was composed of Maginarius, abbot of St. Denis,
Joseph, a deacon, and Count Liuderic—both embassies
thus exemplifying the king’s general custom of combining
clerical and lay officials as his ‘ missi,

The second son of Arichis, viz., Grimwald, was in the
hands of Charlemagne, and Hadrian used every effort to
keep him there. “ Know for certain,” wrote! the Pope to
the Frankish monarch, “that if you send Grimwald to
Beneventum, you will never be able to keep Italy free from
disturbances.” It was equally the aim, on the contrary,
of the widowed Adelperga and the Beneventans to secure
the succession of Grimwald to their dukedom.

Before his death Arichis had endeavoured to strengthen
his position by forming an alliance with Constantine (V.)
VI. and Adalgis (Adelchis), who was at his court. To
arrange the terms of the alliance, two imperial envoys
landed in Lucania and proceeded to Salerno, where they
had an interview with Adelperga (January 20, 788),
finding, of course, that Arichis was no more. As their
negotiations for the return of Grimwald were still pending,
the Beneventans advised the imperial agents to betake
themselves in the interim to Naples. This they did, and
were received with all honours—with banners and images
—by the Neapolitans.?

Not all the Beneventans, however, were anxious for the
rule of Grimwald. A strong party in Capua were desirous
of being governed by Hadrian, and a deputation had early
in January waited upon the Pope to make their wishes
known to him2 Hadrian at once wrote* to Charlemagne’s

que .... cum ceteris civitatibus offeruistis.” Ep. 82 G,

8s Ve
1 Ep. 80 G.
a Bop? 82, 83 G., 85-6 /. Selo:

4 Ep. Had, ap. Epp. Car. ed. /., p. 345, or M7. G. Epp., iii. 654.

436 HADRIAN I.

missi, who had left Rome for the Beneventan territory,
to know what steps he had better take. He pointed out
to the king’s messengers that at least one benefit would
result if he acceded to the wishes of the deputation, and
that would be that two parties would in this way be formed
among the Capuans. Thus divided, they would the easier
be brought to fall in with his views and those of the king.
Acting on the strength of this sound conclusion, he had
caused the members of the deputation to swear fealty in
the ‘confession’ of St. Peter ‘to that apostle, to us, and
to the king of the Franks.’}

Meanwhile the mzss2 of Charlemagne had experienced
a variety of adventures after their departure from Rome
for Beneventum about new-year’s day (788). The late-
ness of the arrival of Count Liuderic caused the two
embassies to get separated, though Hadrian had expressed
his wish to them that they should keep together. Atto
and Goteramnus, passing through Valva, in the duchy of
Spoleto (Castro Valve, some ten miles east of Lago di
Fucino), arrived at Beneventum a few days before
Maginarius and his party, who were by arrangement
following the course of the river Sangro. Of this em-
bassy there is extant? the report which Maginarius sent
to his master, and which we have cited before. On account
of its interest we will let the report speak for itself.

“ When we (2, Maginarius and his two colleagues) learnt
that the men of Beneventum were not disposed (towards
you) as they ought to have been, we notified this to the
other embassy, and asked them, if they judged it best, not
to go on to Salerno before we arrived at Beneventum.

“When we reached the borders of the Beneventan

?“Jurare fecimus in fide ejusdem Dei apostoli et nostra atque
vestree regalis potentiz.” Ep. 86 //., 83 G.

* Jaffe, p. 346.

HADRIAN I, 437

duchy we found there was no sort of loyalty towards
your excellency. Accordingly we despatched a second
letter to Atto and party to await us at Beneventum, that,
as the Apostolic lord (Hadrian) had advised, we might
act together; and if on our arrival at Beneventum we
were all convinced of the loyalty of its people, we might
proceed to Salerno. But if not, we might there together
discuss the Pope’s interests and yours, as you had
ordered.

“We had been informed that they (Atto, etc.) would
await our coming. . . . But when, after journeying through
a disloyal population—against whom may God be opposed
—we reached Beneventum, we found that they had left
for Salerno the day before.

“This distressed us very much, both because we had
not our companions with us, and because those faithful
to you assured us that, if we proceeded on our journey,
the men of Salerno would detain us until they knew
what you intended doing with Grimwald and their envoys.
They, moreover, added that unless we could assure them
at Salerno that you would let Grimwald be their duke,
and give back to them the cities you had granted to St.
Peter and the Pope, they would not fulfil your orders, but
would keep us prisoners. .

“Thereupon I, Maginarius, feigned to be ill, and said that
I could not possibly go on to Salerno. Then, with a view
of getting our friends back, I wrote to Adelperga and others
of the Beneventan nobility, to the effect that I wished to
send on Joseph and Liuderic to them, but that they were
unwilling to go without me. Hence that it would be well
for them to send Atto and Goteramnus back to us, with

1 Cf, the beginning of ep. 82 G., 85 7. Charlemagne had ordered
his mzsst “ut secundum nostrum apostolicum consilium partibus

Beneventanis ita peragerent.”

438 HADRIAN I.

twelve or so of the Beneventan nobility, to whom we might
unfold our commission. And then, if my health permitted,
I would go on to Salerno with the others ; and if not, that
my four companions at least would make their way
thither.

“ Adelperga would, however, only send back Goteram-
nus. And though, when we had discussed the disloyalty
of the Beneventans, he wished to return to Salerno on
account of Atto, we decided it was better for one to be
kept a prisoner than two. And then, at cock-crow, we
fled secretly, and with difficulty reached the territory of
Spoleto (at Valva).”

To the information contained in this mutilated letter of
Maginarius, further particulars may be added from the
letters of Hadrian. The story went, says the Pope, that
Atto, hearing of the flight of his companions, betook him-
self to a church for sanctuary. But the Beneventans
soothed his fears and sent him off to you (Charlemagne),
continues! the Pope, with a feigned offer of submission.
Hadrian also assured? the Frankish king that he had it
on the authority of the priest Gregory, who was one of
the leaders of the party that wished for the surrender of
Capua to the Pope, that his ambassadors were the more
anxious to escape from the city ot Beneventum, because
it had come to their ears that they were to be treacher-.
ously murdered if they returned to Salerno.

Whether there was any solid foundation for this asser-
tion of Gregory, the whole history of this embassy shows
how weak was the hold ot Charlemagne on the duchy
of Beneventum. It may have been consciousness of this
weakness which induced Charlemagne to yield to the
violence of the Beneventans, and to let them have Grim-

1 Ep. 82 G., 85 7 Atto left before Jan. 20, 788, loc. cit.
2 Ep. 83 G., 86 //.

HADRIAN I, 439

wald to rule them, to the great chagrin! of the Pope and
the ultimate disadvantage of the Frankish supremacy.

About Gregory and his party at Capua, the extant
documents of the time say no more. From the donation
of Louis the Pious, however, it may be safely concluded
that a slice, at any rate, of the duchy of Beneventum
was made over to Hadrian, inclusive of Capua.

Hence it may be noted that, before his death, Hadrian
was the ruler not only of the exarchate and the Penta-
polis, but of the duchy of Rome, which we must now
think of as stretching from Grosseto (Roselle) on the
Ombrone to Capua on the Vulturno, and including Sora,
Arpino, Arce, on the left bank of the Garigliano (Liris),
and Aquino, Teano, Capua, which lay between the Vul-
turno and the Garigliano, and of the territories of Amelia,
Todi and Perugia, which connected his Roman dominions
with those on the Adriatic. Whether or not he had given
up claims to them, he certainly was not the ruler of the
duchies of Spoleto or Beneventum, of Venetia or Istria.

Even whilst engaged in these political struggles, Hadrian eae
had also to cope with religious difficulties of no mean ist’ heresy.
order. He had to deal with a new heresy, or, rather, with
a new phase of an old one, viz., Adoptionism, and with
one which had for some sixty years been disturbing the
peace of the Church, especially in the East, z.., Iconoclasm.

The beginnings of Adoptionism are wrapped in some
obscurity; but they are thought to have sprung from some
controversies with the little-known doctrines of ‘a certain
Migetius.2. Among other rather wild doctrines, he taught
that in the Blessed Trinity were three corforeal persons,
that David was God the Father incarnate; Our Lord, born
of the Blessed Virgin, was the second person, and that St,

? Ep. 84 G., 87 /.
2 On the doctrines, etc., of Migetius, Héfélé, Conc., v. asf, Fr. ed.

440 HADRIAN I.

Paul was the third person of the Blessed Trinity. His
errors were condemned in a council at Seville (782), and
by the Pope.t The heresy of Migetius would not demand
our attention were it not the occasion of ‘ Adoptionism.’?
The principal opponent in Spain of the doctrines of
Migetius was Elipandus, Archbishop of Toledo. In
arguing against his errors on the subject of the ‘corporeal
persons’ of the Blessed Trinity, Elipandus went to the
other extreme, and denied that the second person of the
Blessed Trinity had a real human nature at all. He
held that the human nature of God the Son was only
an ‘adopted’ nature; and hence that Jesus Christ was
not the true Son of God, but only His ‘adopted’ son. He
thus practically revived the heresy of Nestorius. For
the inference from the teaching of Nestorius, that was
so fatal to that heresiarch in the eyes of the people of
Ephesus, viz. that Our Lady was not the Mother of
God, was equally applicable to the doctrine of Elipandus.
It was further maintained, by at least some of the followers
of Elipandus, that the second person ‘adopted’ the man
Christ at the time of the baptism in the Jordan, and that
consequently from that moment Jesus Christ was the Son
of God by ‘adoption,’

One of the first and ablest of the supporters of Elipandus
was Felix, Bishop of Urgel in the Spanish March, ze, in
that part of the north-east of Spain which was under the
power of Charlemagne. By the year 785 controversy on
the subject ran high; and Spaniards in the far Asturias

1 Cf. Cod. C., Epp. 95, 96,97 G., addressed ‘to all the bishops of
Spain,’ or to Egila, Bishop of Elvira. The Pope declares that no evil
need be feared if the doctrine of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic
Roman Church be followed. “Si doctrinam S. C. et Ap. Rom,
Ecclesiae secutus fueris, non timebis mala,” etc. Ep. 95 G.

7 On ‘Adoptionism, ¢f Heéfélé, Conc., v. § 390; Alzog, Church
ZZists, ia SMS.

HADRIAN I. A4I

wrote in opposition to Elipandus. Speedily informed of
what was going on, Hadrian wrote a long letter! ‘to all
the orthodox bishops of Spain’ this same year (785). He
reminds them that the Roman Church is the head of the
Churches throughout the world, and that whoever severs
nimself from that Church is out of the Christian religion ;
and says he has heard that certain bishops in Spain,
setting at naught the doctrine of the Apostolic See, have
introduced various new heresies. They, however, must strive
to keep intact the doctrine which their predecessors received
from ‘our holy Catholic and Apostolic See’; and hence
must not allow to creep in among them the poisonous
doctrines of Elipandus and his followers, “who do not?
blush to affirm that the Son of God is an adopted son,
a blasphemy which no other heretic has dared to enun-
ciate, except Nestorius, who made out that the Son of
God was a mere man.” The Pope next establishes the
orthodox faith by proofs drawn from the New Testament
and from the Fathers.

This letter produced no effect. The heresy continued
to spread. By the command of Charlemagne a synod was
assembled at Ratisbon in 792. Here the doctrine of the
Adoptionists was condemned. Felix retracted and was
sent to Rome to Pope Hadrian? In St. Peter's, in
presence of the Pope, Felix again abjured his heresy. He
solemnly placed one written profession of faith on the
Sacred Species, and another on the tomb of St. Peter; and
engaged on oath to believe and to teach that Jesus Christ
was the true Son of God and not His adopted son.

TE pws iG:

2 “Filium Dei adoptivum confiteri non erubescunt, quod nullus
e qualibet heeresi antea talem,” etc. 70.

3 Cf. Annal. Fuld.; Eginhard, etc., ap. Héfélé, Conc., v. § 394

(Fr: ed.). ;
4 See the original authorities cited by Héfélé, Conc., v. § 395 (Fr. ed.).

442 HADRIAN I.

Returned to Spain, he returned to his errors; and, that he
might be free to propagate his views, he withdrew into a
part of Spain that was under the sway of the Moors.
Charlemagne now began to take energetic measures to
combat the advances made by the new heresy. His first
step was to recall his trusty counsellor, Alcuin, from
England: “Heresy! is spreading in our lands; make
haste thou to help us.” Finding, however, all his efforts
to move Felix, to whom he was personally attached, quite
unavailing, Alcuin advised Charlemagne to summon
another council to discuss the affair. The Frankish king,
who had been asked by certain of the Spanish bishops,
quite in the usual style of heretics who always appeal to
the civil power, to decide the controversy himself, sent their
communications to the Pope? begged his advice, and

pice assembled a council at Frankfort in the beginning of

at Frank-

fort, 794.

the summer of 794, ‘by apostolic authority.’? Bishops,
how many is not exactly known, came from all parts
of Charlemagne’s dominions. Two came to represent
the Pope.t Adoptionism was again condemned. Two
refutations of it were drawn up and approved by the
council. Among the decrees (cafztula) drawn up by this
council, as we shall have occasion to mention more in detail
presently, there was one (the second) which condemned
the Seventh General Council of Nice for teachings in
reference to holy images, which were never enunciated
by that Council. Hadrian also condemned the Adop-
tionist documents, which Charlemagne had sent him, in
a letter ° addressed to the bishops of Gaul and Spain. “As

1 Alc, Adv. Elip., 1. i, ap. Frobenius, the Prince-abbot of St.
Emmeran, Of. Alc., i. 882.

2 Ep. Had., ap. Mansi, xiii. 865. * Cf. canon i. of the council.
4 Eginhard, Azmal., an. 794, ap. Pertz,i.; and Annal. Vet. Franc.,
ap. £2, t, 96.

5 Referred to above, note 2.

HADRIAN I, 443

it isa question of the faith,” writes the Pope, “we have
been obliged to reply to the letter of the Spaniards in
writing and with the authority of the Apostolic See.” This
letter of the Pope, and the two refutations of Adoptionism,
drawn up by the Italian and Frankish bishops respectively,
were sent by Charlemagne to Elipandus and the other
bishops of Spain, along with a letter! from himself. The
king of the Franks opens his letter with ardent. words
in praise of the blessings of ‘unity. His warrior nature
displays itself in the comparisons he uses, “As the
ordered array of an army dnd the united bravery of
the soldiers strikes terror into the enemy ”—doubtless
Charlemagne was thinking of the effect his disciplined
forces produced on the unorganised courage of the Saxons
—“so the peaceful union of the sons of our holy Mother

1 Mansi, xiii. p. 899f; P. Z., t. 98 p. 899. “Ad beatissimum
apostolicze sedis pontificem, de hac nova inventione, nostre devotionis
ter quaterque direximus missos; scire cupientes quid sancta Rom.
Ecc., apost. edocta traditionibus, de hac respondere voluisset in-
quisitione.” The attitude taken up by Charlemagne towards the
Holy See, on this and other occasions (cf. Cap., 28, §§ 8 and 55, ed.
Boretius.), ought to have been enough to have prevented Mr. Davis
(Charlemagne, p. 16, etc.) representing Charlemagne as exercising
‘the supreme power of both kinds,’ viz., of State and Church. No
doubt Charlemagne exercised a great deal of power which properly
belonged to ecclesiastics ; but it was exercised with some dependence
on the authorities of the Church, and, to a greater or less extent, on the
lines of established Canon Law. In his behaviour towards the Church
in his dominions, arbitrary indeed but beneficial, Charlemagne was but
following in the footsteps of his predecessors, as well Merovingian as
Carolingian. But even under the barbarous Merovingians, if there was
interference in ecclesiastical concerns, especially in those which had a
marked political side, there was respect for the authority of the Pope
and the bishops. And so if we find them, on the one hand, refusing to
allow a synod to be held (c. 644), of which they had not had previous
notice (7. G. Efp., iii. 212), yet, on the other, they acknowledged the
binding force of Canon Law until the authority of the Pope or a synod
could deal with the matter—“usque ad pape notitiam vel sinodale
audientiam,” 20., p. 438, ¢. 540.

444 HADRIAN I.

the Church within the wall of the Catholic faith is terrible
to the powers of darkness.” He exhorts them to humbly
search after the truth: “for it is better to be a learner of
the truth than a teacher of falsehood.” .. . “The faith of
all Christians must be one.” . .. “That the Spaniards are
under the yoke of the infidel is pitiful, but that they should
fall under the sway of unbelief or schism would be more
so.” ... To bring them back to the unity of the faith, he
had summoned a council, and “on this new invention had
three or four times sent embassies to the most blessed
pontiff of the Apostolic See, to learn what answer to these
questions would be given by the Holy Roman Church,
taught as it was by the traditions of the Apostles.” As
for himself, he unites himself to the great numbers and
authority of the fathers of the council, to the Apostolic
See, and to the ancient Catholic traditions that have come
down from the early Church, rather than to the small
number of Spaniards who have put forth a new doctrine.
He entreats the Spaniards to do likewise, to remain with
him firmly attached to the profession of the one Catholic
faith, and not to consider themselves wiser than the
Universal Church; and he reminds them that if they
will not heed the apostolic authority and the unanimous
voice of the synod, they must be accounted heretics, with
whom he must not be in communion. Charlemagne
concludes this letter, so full of the truest Catholic spirit,
with a profession of faith drawn from the Nicene and
Athanasian creeds.

This action on the part of the Frankish monarch did
not, unfortunately, put an end to the heresy it was directed
against. Even after the death of Hadrian, controversy
on the subject was still brisk. Fresh apologies for
his doctrine poured from the pen of Felix. These
Charlemagne sent to Rome, and in response to the wishes

HADRIAN I. AAS

of the king, Leo III. held a council! of 157 bishops in
St. Peter’s (799). Here the doctrines of the Adoptionists
were once more condemned. More effective than this,
however, in putting an end to the Adoptionist heresy,
was a mission which Charlemagne sent into the province
of Urgel, to explain the true faith to the people. Besides
bringing back thousands to the faith, they induced Felix
again to present himself before a council. In the autumn
of 799, at a council convened by Charlemagne, overcome
by the logic of Alcuin, Felix once again renounced his
errors. A second mission sent by Charlemagne to Urgel,
the death of Elipandus—and Adoptionism died the death.?

Whilst combating a new heresy in the West, Hadrian
was helping to deal a severe blow at another in the East.
The life of one hundred and twenty years of the Iconoclast
controversy may be conveniently divided into three periods.
In the first, from the publication of Leo III.’s first decree
against the images (726) to the death of his grandson Leo IV.
(780), the Ionoclasts were masters of the situation. From
that event (780) to the accession of Leo V., the Armenian
(813), especially whilst power was in the hands of the
Athenian Irene, the orthodox party were in the ascendant ;
but under Leo V., Michael II. and Theophilus, Iconoclasm
was again rampant, till it was finally suppressed under
Theodore (842). In 755 died miserably the tyrant Con-
stantine Copronymus, crying out, according to Theophanes,
that he was already tasting of the fire which is never to be
extinguished. His son Leo IV., whose attention was fully
occupied by the Saracens, and whose reign was but short
(775-780), only began to prove himself a persecutor a few
months before his death (October 780). The supreme

1 Héfélé, v. 147, Fr. ed.
2 Hergenréther, Hist. de PEglise, iii. § 176.
3 Ad an. 767.

Icono-
clasm and
theSeventh
General
Council.

446 HADRIAN Tf.

power now fell into the hands of Leo’s wife, the beautiful
but ambitious Irene, as regent for her young son
Constantine VI., Porphyrogenitus. Under Irene the
‘worship’ of images was tolerated at once. And in
compliance with the exhortations of Pope Hadrian,
she decided to take measures for the restoration of the
images and of communion with the West. Wars with
the Saracens and Slavs prevented any active steps being
taken for a few years, but at length matters were brought
to a head, after a cessation of those wars, by the resignation
of the patriarch Paul (August 784). On leaving his See
he expressed his regret to the empress and her son that he
had ever “sat in the sacerdotal throne of Constantinople,
inasmuch as that Church was tyrannised over, and cut
off by the other thrones from communion with them.”
And to the nobles he added: “Unless you assemble a
general council and put an end to your errors, there is no
hope of salvation for you.”? By the empress and people,
Tarasius, a layman and imperial secretary, was selected
to succeed Paul. Tarasius, however, after pointing out
that the Church of Constantinople was anathematised
as well by the other Churches of the East as by the West,
and that there was need in the Church of one faith, one
baptism, and concord and agreement in other ecclesiastical
matters, declared that he would only accept their choice
of him if the rulers would bring about a general council.3
After some demur on the part of the partisans of Icono-
clasm, the condition was agreed to, and Tarasius was

1 Cf. his letter to the empress and her son, read at the beginning
of the second session of the Seventh Council. He asks for the
restoration of the images “recordationis causa.” Cf. also the close
of the Pope’s long letter to Charlemagne, printed at the end of the
Seventh Council: “Synodum istam secundum nostram ordinationem
(imperatores) fecerunt.”

* All from Theoph., 2” Chron,, ad an. 770-7. Bras

HADRIAN t. 449

consecrated on Christmas Day, 784. He at once wrote
to the Oriental patriarchs and to the Pope, requesting
them to send delegates to assist at a General Council2
Irene also wrote to Hadrian a letter which is found pre-
fixed to the Acts of the Seventh General Council (August
785), in the different collections? of the Councils. Saluting
Hadrian as ‘the most holy head, who had received from
Our Lord the highest dignity among the priests, as he has
given us (viz. Constantine and Irene) the chief power in
the State, she says that, with the advice of her priests
and people, she has decreed the holding of an cecumenical
council; and begs the Pope to come in person to it “as
the true? first priest and the one who presides in the
place and See of St. Peter’s.” If the Pope cannot come
in person, he is entreated to send venerable and learned
men with letters from him to represent him.

In his reply to the empress (October 785), which was
read * in the second session of the Seventh General Council,
Hadrian rejoices in her intention to restore the orthodox
faith by the restoration of the images. “Blessed Peter’

1 Theoph., 27% Chron., ad an. 776-7; and the letter of Tarasius
to the patriarchs of Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem, read at the
beginning of the third session of the Seventh General Council. On
the reading of this letter the papal envoys said that the Pope had
received a letter ‘to the same effect,’

2 Or ap. Migne, P. Z., t. 129, p. 199, which is the third vol. of the
works of Anastasius Bibliothec. : “utpote ab ipso nos quidem imperium,
vos vero principalis sacerdotii dignitatem suscipientes.”

3 7b. “Tamquam verus primus sacerdos, et is qui in loco et sede
S. Petri praesidet.”

4 Not in its entirety; for, with the consent of the papal legates,
certain passages in which the uncanonical election of Tarasius was
blamed by the Pope were omitted. The complete letter of the Pope
was given by Anastasius Bib., in his translation of the acts of this
Council. (The letter will be found in Migne, P. L., t. 96.)

5 “Ipse Princeps App. B. Petrus, .... apostolatus principatum,
ac principalis cure, successoribus suis, qui in ejus sacratissima
sede perenniter sessuri sunt, dereliquit ; quibus et auctoritatis potes-

448 HADRIAN I.

the Prince of the Apostles, left to his successors, who were
for ever to sit in his Sacred See, the chief power of the
Apostolate, just as he had himself received it from Our
Saviour. And it is by their tradition that we venerate
the images of Our Lord, His Blessed Mother and the
Saints.” The Pope then at some length defends a rational
use of images from the testimony of the Sacred Scriptures
and the Fathers, and bewails the folly of those who would
forbid the honouring of images, “in which are contained
the histories of Our Lord and the Saints.” If an cecu-
menical council had to be held, the pseudo-synod (of 753 or
754), held without the sanction of the Apostolic See, must
be anathematised, and a safe conduct for the Pope’s
legates and a declaration of impartiality must be tendered
by the rulers. Hadrian also asked for the restoration
of the ‘patrimonies’ and his patriarchal rights, which
had been taken away by Leo the Isaurian, and expressed
his astonishment that the ‘title of universal patriarch’ had
in her letter been given to Tarasius by the empress. The
title ought not to be employed, as it would seem to imply
that the patriarch of Constantinople had the primacy which
had been given by Our Lord to the Roman Church through
Peter. Had it not been for his orthodoxy, the Pope could
not have consented to the uncanonical election of Tarasius.
To Tarasius himself, quite in the same strain, the Pope
wrote another letter, which was also read in the second
session of the Council.

No direct answer to the letter of Tarasius came from
the Oriental patriarchs themselves, for the simple reason
that, owing to the hostility of the Saracens, it never

tatem, quemadmodum a Salvatore nostro D. Deo ipsi concessa est
suis contulit, etc. Quorum traditione,” etc. Migne, P. LZ. t. 96.
The Greek translation weakens considerably the force of this
passage.

HADRIAN I. 449

reached them.) An answer, however, came from certain
‘archiereis of the East, as they style themselves, zz., as
is clear from the context and the present use of the word
among the Greeks, superiors of monasteries. By the
advice of these men, the messengers of Tarasius did
not proceed on their journey to the Oriental patriarchs,
for fear of stirring up the Mohammedans against the
whole body of Christians under their rule. But they
(the messengers) returned with John and Thomas, syncelli,
or chaplains, of the patriarchs of Antioch and Alexandria
respectively, who were commissioned to testify to ‘the
apostolic tradition’ of the East, ‘which they knew well.’?
“Should you wish to hold a synod,” the letter continues,
“be not concerned at the absence of the three patriarchs
and of the bishops under them ; for this is due to the
threats of their temporal rulers (the Saracens), and not
to their own wish. Their absence did not interfere with
the authority of the Sixth General Council, especially
as the Pope of Rome gave his assent to it (concor-
daverit).” ...“To give weight to our letter, we send
the synodical letter which Theodore, patriarch of Jerusalem,
once sent to the patriarchs Cosmas of Alexandria and

1 Cf the letter next to be quoted from certain distinguished Oriental
monks, which was read in the third session of the Seventh General
Council. Finlay, The Byzantine Empire, p. 88, says, speaking of this
Council: “ An attempt was made to deceive the world into a belief that
they (the Oriental patriarchs) were represented, by allowing two monks
from Palestine to present themselves as the syncelli of these patriarchs,
without scrutinising the validity of their credentials.” No such attempt
was ever made. The charge is simply ridiculous, and could never have
been made by a man who had read the ‘credentials’ of the monks.
Their ‘credentials,’ z.2., the letter written by them to Tarasius, were
publicly read in the third session of the Council, and explain the whole
state of the case perfectly. Other remarks of Finlay on this Council
are equally accurate.

2 “Scientes liquido trium apostolicarum sedium concinentem et
concordantem orthodoxiam.” (Ep. read at the third session.)

VOL, I. PT. II. 29

450 HADRIAN IL.

Theodore of Antioch; and which called forth responsive
letters from them to him.”

An attempt to hold the council in Constantinople
(August 786) failed owing to the violence of the imperial
bodyguard, a band of men full, of course, of the views
of Constantine and Leo. Next year, however, after
Irene had disbanded the old bodyguard and formed a
new one, the bishops again met, to the number of some
350,2 at Nicaea, and held their first session in September,
787. Though Tarasius directed the work of the synod,
the Pope’s legates held the first place? in the assembly,
as the acts, which they always sign first, show. The
enemies of the holy images were anathematised, and the
Council, at the end of the seventh session, decreed that
“images of Our Lord, of our immaculate Mother, and
of the Saints in any material might be placed anywhere.
The oftener one looked on these representations, the
more would the onlooker be stirred to the remem-
brance of the originals, to imitate them, and to offer
his greeting and his reverence to them (do7acmoyv Kat
TYyNTKHY TpocKUyycw), Not the actual worship of ‘latria’
(rav adnOunv AaTpelav), which belonged to the Godhead
alone; but that he should offer, as to the figure of the
cross, the books of the holy Gospels, and to the other
sacred things, incense and lights in their honour, as this
had been the sacred custom with the ancients; for the
honour which is shown to the figure passes over to the

LECIASUD.. Po 304.

* That is the number given in the Vit. Had., ap. Z. P., and by the
deacon Epiphanius in his discourse to the synod at its close.

3 Cf. also the fragmentary life, ap. Mab., which says that the holy
Seventh Council was held “imperante Constant. et Irene, Jr@esidente
quoque domino Had. papa per swos Jlegatos.” In his letter to
Charlemagne on the image question, Hadrian says: “Synodum

istam secundum nostram ordinationem fecerunt.” (Ep., ap. Migne,
Le Lay ta Qow pa l2o Le)

HADRIAN 1. pst

original, and whoever does reverence (rpockuvet) to an
image does reverence to the person represented by it.”

At an eighth session, held in Constantinople, the decree
was signed by Irene and Constantine. It is interesting
to note that “the scene is represented in a Greek MS.,
now in the Vatican, and the young emperor (the empress
is omitted) is the most conspicuous personage. In the
foreground is a prostrate figure, which seems to represent
the spirit of Iconoclasm that was now overthrown.”2 On
the termination of the Council, Tarasius wrote? to the
Pope (788), whom he speaks of as adorned with the high
priesthood and as hastening to destroy error with the
sword of the Spirit, to inform him of what had been done
at the Council, how they had all embraced the confession
of the truth which the Pope had sent; and how the
emperors had reérected the images both in the Churches
and in the palaces. The Pope’s legates returned with
letters from Irene and with the Acts of the Council in
Greek, bearing the autograph signatures of the empress
and her son. Thus, for a time at least, the image question
was at rest in the East.

But in the West it was quite the reverse. Where there TheFranks
had been peace on the image question there was now mae
war. Though Hadrian did not send a formal confirmation aes
of the Council to Irene, because his just demands, in
connection with the restoration of the patrimonies and

1 Cf, Héfélé, Conc., v. p. 374, Eng. trans. Cf the decree passed at
the end of the fourth session; and cc. 9, 10 and 54 of Hadrian’s

answer to the Caroline Books. “Demonstrantes eas (imagines)...
honorabilem salutationem, nequaquam secundum fidem nostram veram
culturam que decet sole divine nature.”

2 The Church and the Eastern Empire, p. 114, by Tozer.

3 The letter is printed among the acts of the eighth session.
“Przedicabatur a nobis omnibus recta et irreprehensibilis confessio,
quze nobis missa est a vobis.”

4 7. P., in Vit. Had.

“482 HADRIAN IL.

of his jurisdiction in the diocese of Illyricum, had not
been attended to, he nevertheless received the Council,
and ordered its acts to be translated into Latin. His
orders were obeyed indeed ; but so bad a translation was
made that Anastasius, the librarian, who again translated
the acts, assured? Pope John VIII. that the first inter-
preters had employed such a slavish word - for - word
translation that the sense of the original could scarcely
ever be discovered. Up to this the Franks entertained the
same rational views with regard to the use of images
as was entertained then in the other countries of the
West,? and as is entertained now in the Catholic Church.
Even to this day the use of images is not so great in
the West as in the East. Reflecting on this fact, and

_ that Charlemagne was annoyed at Irene for breaking off

The Caro-
line Books.

the engagement between her son and his daughter, it
need cause no great surprise that the arrival, among the
Franks, of a bad translation of the Acts of the Seventh
Gerieral Council caused considerable disturbances in their
country. And in combating what they supposed to be
the blasphemous idolatry of the Greeks, they, at least to
some extent, left the ‘via media’ in which they had pre-
viously been, and denied that any, even relative, honour was,
in practice at any rate, to be paid to the sacred images.

In 790 appeared the famous Caroline Books, which,
issued under the name of Charlemagne, are often ground-
lessly attributed* to Alcuin. These books (four in

1 Cf. his letter to Charlemagne printed at the end of the Acts of the
Seventh Council, and the Z. P. “Ipsum suscepimus Synodum.”
Ep. ad Carol.

2 Prasfat. Anast. in Sept. Synod. The preface of the Lzdrz Carol.
speaks of the translation as “ e/ogwentia sensuque carens.”

3 Cf. sup., p. 375, for the faith of the Frank bishops on this subject.

* “On conjecture only, and contrary to evidence,” says Lingard
(A.-Sax. Ch. i. 193). Alcuin is known to have ‘adored or
worshipped’ the cross, like the rest of his countrymen (cf Bede,

HADRIAN I. 453

number)* condemned alike the Council of Constantinople
(753 or 754) for ordering the destruction of images, which
the books consider useful, and the Council of Nice for
ordering their adoration. Throughout, the Caroline Books,
ignoring the plain distinction between adoring images
absolutely, and adoring them relatively, a distinction which
the Council of Nice had made clear by the use of the
words ‘latria’ on the one hand and ‘proskunésis’ on the
other, speak as though the Seventh General Council had
placed the ‘adoration’ or worship to be offered to the
Blessed Trinity and to images on the same level. Hence,
at the close of the preface of the first book, its authors
say* that “they hold to the orthodox doctrine, according
to which images must serve only to ornament the churches
and to recall past events, while God alone must be adored,
and His saints only honoured with the veneration which
is their due; and hence they neither break the images
with the one synod, nor adore them with the other.”
Throughout these books also there is displayed a great
want of accuracy, and the animus of their authors® against

Vit, Abb., c. 17, etc.), “not,” as the Saxon homilist (Aelfric) observes,
“that by this word (worshippers of the cross) they understood any
idolatrous worship paid to the wood or metal of which it was formed,
but a worship paid to the Almighty Lord, who was fixed to the Cross
for our sake” (ap. Lingard, 4.-Sax. Ch., ii. 99). Of Alcuin in
particular we are told (zz wit., c. 9) that he had a habit of bowing
before a cross and saying: “We worship Thy cross, O Lord, and
call to mind Thy glorious passion. Have mercy on us, Thou who
hast suffered for us.”

1 Ap. Migne, P. L., t. 98, pp. 999-1248. .

2 Preefat. in lib. i., 7%., p. 1006. “Nos... . imagines in ornamentis
ecclesiarum et memoria rerum gestarum habentes, et solum Deum
adorantes et ejus sanctis opportunam venerationem exhibentes,” etc.

3 It is not known who the authors of these books really were. No
one, however, supposes them to be the unaided production of
Charlemagne. He says they were issued with the assent of the
bishops of his kingdom. “Opus aggressi sumus cum conniventia
sacerdotum in regno a Deo nobis concesso.” (Preefat., 20.)

‘454, HADRIAN I,

the Eastern rulers is displayed by the absurd points?
which they endeavour to make against them—eg., their
arrogance in giving to their letters the name of ‘ Divalia.’
Other matters not at all to the point are discussed in
these ‘books,’ such as the ‘ procession’ of the Holy Ghost
in the beginning of the third book; and some of the
arguments for the worship of images, which had been
adduced by some of the more simple Fathers of the
Nicene Council, are crushed with pitiless logic. But in
some cases the authors of the Caroline books, either in
bad faith, or misled by the wretched translation that had
fallen into their hands, erected men of straw for them-
selves, and then triumphantly demolished them. Smartly
do they attack* the Nicene bishops for putting images
and the Blessed Eucharist on the same level. The
Council of Nice, however, so far from doing anything of
the sort, would not even have the ‘unbloody sacrifice’
called the ‘image of Christ’;% for, of course, it was in
their eyes Christ Himself, and not an image of any kind.
Again, the Caroline books find no difficulty in annihilating
the Seventh Council for approving of the language of
Constantine, Bishop of Constantia, in Cyprus, who had
the courage to give voice to what the rest of the council 4
thought, and to say boldly that he paid the same homage
to images as he paid to the Blessed Trinity. Constantine,

1 Cf. L. i. c. 1-4 (Lz. Carol.)

UL20, Car, i. C, 27.

$“Nullus app. aut illustrium Patrum incruentum sacrificium
nostrum .... dixit imaginem corporis ejus.” Such is the language
of the third part of the refutation of the false synod of 753 or 754,
read at the sixth session of the Seventh General Council. “Non
eequiparaverunt,” plainly says Pope Hadrian (c. 38) in his letter to
Charlemagne in connection with these books.
ot Lib. Car., iti. c. 17. “Constantinus, episcopis ceeteris consen-
tientibus, .... absurditatem quam illi introrsus retinent latenter,
hanc iste egerit patenter,”

HADRIAN I. 455

as a matter of fact, had said: “I embrace with honour the
holy and venerable images, but true adoration (apockivyawg
kata Narpeiay) I offer to the Holy Trinity alone”! There
is no doubt that the supposed utterance of Constantine was
what most put the Franks on the wrong tack in their
estimation of the work of the Seventh General Council.
And so, as we shall see presently, they were the very
words singled out for condemnation by the Council of
Frankfort. With glorious inconsistency, too, the Lzdrz
assert?: “Whilst in the matter of images we despise
nothing except the ‘adoration’ of them, they (the Fathers
of the Counc#l) place’ all their faith in them; though
we venerate the saints in their dodzes, or rather in the
relics of their bodies, and in their vestments, according
to the tradition of the ancient Fathers!”

Of one thing in their reckless attack on the seventh
synod the authors of the Lzbvi were careful; and that
was to show their loyalty to the Holy See. Anxious
lest, whilst attacking a council presided over by the
Pope’s legates, they might be thought wanting in respect
to the See of Rome, they take an early opportunity of
setting forth “how much the Roman Church has been
raised by Our Lord above the other churches, and how
it must be consulted by the faithful.”* Only those texts
of Scripture are to be recognised which are taken from
the books acknowledged by her to be canonical, and

1 The words occur in the third session. In the version of Anastasius
(Migne, P. Z.,t. 98, p. 268) they are translated as follows : “ Amplectens
honorabiliter sanctas et venerabiles imagines: atque adorationem que
per latriam, id est, Deo debitam servitutem efficitur, soli superstantiali
Trinitati impendo.”

2 7b, C., iii. 16. Cf 2. ii. c. 28-30, where it is stated that

veneration is due to the Cross, to the sacred vessels and to the

Books of the Holy Scripture.
3 7$,i.c.6. “Dignum duximus ut qualiter sancta Romana ecclesia
ceteris Ecclesiis a Domino prezlata et a fidelibus consulenda sit. . . ,”

The
Council of
Frankfort,

794

The Caro-
line Books
sent to the
Pope,
7924+

456 HADRIAN L

only those Fathers are to be considered as authorities
who have been acknowledged by the Roman pontiffs.
As the apostles were above the other disciples, and
Peter pre-eminent over the apostles, so the apostolic
Sees are above the other Sees, and the Roman See
above the other apostolic Sees. . . . After Christ, to obtain
help to strengthen their faith, all must turn to her, who
has no spot or blemish, who crushes heresy and strengthens
the faithful in their faith! Hence, with that Church, the
authors of the Lzér¢ would be one even in matters not
of faith, as in modes of worship and singing.

Whether the Caroline Books were presented to the
Fathers of the Council of Frankfort or not, it is certain
that the question of the decision of the Second Council
of Nice was discussed by them. For among the fifty-six
‘chapters’ (cafitula) which they drew up, the second
declared that the Greek synod, held at Constantinople
(the last session of the Second Council of Nice was held
in the imperial city), had condemned those who would
not render to images the ‘adoration’ they rendered to
the Blessed Trinity. All the bishops here present have
refused to give ‘adoration’ to images, and have rejected
the synod.? It is quite plain that the bishops at Frank-
fort were under a completely wrong impression as to
what the Seventh General Council had really decided.

Either in 792 or 794 the Caroline Books were sent to
the Pope; or, rather, probably some abridgment of them.

1 Z76,C.,i.c.6. After pointing out that holy and learned men all over
the world have not only not receded from the Roman Church, but in time
of necessity have turned to it for the strengthening of their faith, the
authors of the Zzbv¢ add: “ Quod regulariter, omnes catholicze debent
observare Ecclesia, ut ab ea post Christum ad muniendam fidem
adjutorium petant; quee non habens maculam,” etc,

2 Cf. Eginhard, Annal., an. 794, ap. MZ. G. SS., i, and Annal. Vet.
Franc., ib. or ap. P. L., t. 98, ad an. 794. The Annal. V. speak of
the Greek synod “de adorandis sanctorum imaginibus,”

HADRIAN I. 457

At any rate, it is quite certain,! from Hadrian’s reply to
them, that they were not sent to him in the form in
which we now have them. The objectionable proposi-
tions were sent to the Pope, “to be corrected in accord-
ance with his judgment.”? A very lengthy reply? was
sent by the Pope either in 794 or 795. Hadrian reminds
Charlemagne that the care of the Church was given by
Our Lords tom St yPeter and his’ successors; and says
that in replying to the king’s communication, point by
point, he will hold to the tradition of the holy Catholic
and Apostolic Roman Church. Hadrian then proceeds to
reply to a great number of points which are by no means
exactly those of the Caroline books, as we have them
to-day. In unfolding the tradition of the Roman Church,
Hadrian declares that time would fail him were he to
attempt to enumerate * the churches his predecessors have
built and adorned with statues and paintings, and to set
forth the veneration they have paid them. The Seventh
Council, he said, decided, in accordance with the teaching
of St. Gregory I. and his own, that honour was to be
given to holy images, but true worship (vera cultura)
only to the Divine nature. Hence he concludes: “We
accept the council. For if we did not, and men returned to
the vomit of their error, who would be responsible on
the great accounting day for the loss of so many thou-
sand Christian souls but we ourselves?”5.... “We
are more concerned for the salvation of souls and the
preservation of the true faith than for the possession of
the world.” This was said by Hadrian in reference to

1 This point is abundantly proved by Héfélé, Conc., v. § 401,
Fr. ed.

2 Cf. Conc. Paris., ad an. 825, ap. P. L., 2b., p. 1300.

8 P. L., 7b. p. 1247 seg., or ap. M. G. Epp., v. p. 5f.

4 Ep.ad Carol. Ap. P. L., 2b, p. 1286.

5 /b., p. 1291.

458 HADRIAN I.

the claim he had made to the Greek emperor for the
restoration of the confiscated patrimonies.

With this, the image-difficulty was for the time settled
among the Franks. The images remained in their churches ;
they still continued to onour the cross, the book of the
Gospels, etc., and, beyond all doubt, the images them-
selves! though perhaps with less demonstration than the
cross, relics and the rest. Up to this day has image-
worship been practised in France through the long
succession of the centuries. And as the traveller makes
his way from village to village, and from town to town,
throughout the length and breadth of sunny France, his
mind is constantly raised to the thought of higher
things by the frequently-recurring sight of the sign of
our redemption or of the image of Our Lady or some
Saint. Material objects indeed are they; but none so
calculated to make us less material.

Before, however, leaving this question, we may be per-
mitted to quote here a letter? to the Pope from our
countryman Alcuin, which many think was called forth
by this image controversy. The letter is assigned to the
July or August of 794. Alcuin opens his letter by implor-
ing the prayers of that “venerable man, who was illustrious

1 Cf. sup., p. 375, for the real belief of the Franks, as shown by the assent
of twelve of their bishops to the decree of the Lateran Council relative
to the honour to be paid to images. This action of the Frank bishops
was appealed to by Pope Hadrian in his reply to the Caroline Books
(ap. P. L., 26, p. 1275). There can be no doubt that had the Franks
grasped the force of the decree of the Seventh Council, there would
have been no difficulties in Gaul on the subject of image-worship.
And if the different significations of the word ‘adorare’ had been made
clear, z.e., if proper technical terms had been at once invented in Latin, ~
as they had in Greek, they would have comprehended the decree.
More has certainly been heard in modern times of the Caroline Books
and the opposition of the Franks to image-worship than was heard in

the eighth century.
* Monument. Alc. ap. Bib. Rer. Germ, Vi. p. 243.

HADRIAN L 459

throughout the whole world for his goodness,” and who
was “the heir of that wondrous power” of binding and
loosing in heaven and on earth. He confesses himself a
miserable sinner (for opposing the Pope at the Council
of Frankfort on the matter of the images), and prays
Hadrian to absolve him from his sins. He begs God
long to preserve the life ‘of such a pastor.’

In view especially of certain utterly baseless theories Hadrian
that many are endeavouring to have accepted in this Eagland.
country, the account of Hadrian’s dealings with England
will doubtless be more interesting to Englishmen than
the Iconoclast controversy. In 773 the Pope granted
the pallium to Ethelbert of York,' and in 780 we read
in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that King Alfwold sent
to him for the pallium for Eanbald, the successor of
Ethelbert. A little later (786), understanding that things
were not as they should be in England, Hadrian sent
over to this country two special legates, George, Bishop
of Ostia, and Theophylact, Bishop of Todi, “to renew?
the faith and peace which St. Gregory had sent us
by Augustine, the bishop, and they were worshipfully
received and sent away in peace.” There also came
along with the bishops one Wighod, an ambassador
from Charlemagne. What the legates did we can best
learn from the letter? of George to the Pope. He says

1 Chron. de Maitlros., ap. Jaffé, Regest., ad an. 773.

2 Anglo-Sax. Chron., ad an. 78 5—translation of the Church Hist.
of England series. Cf. Chron. de Maitlros.,tb.,adan. 786. “ Legatos
dirigit, ut fidem catholicam innovent et confirment,” and Simeon of
Durham, ad an. 786.

3 Mon. Alc., Bib. R. Germ., vi. p. 155; also ap. Haddan and Stubbs.
“Tle cum ingenti gaudio ob reverentiam b. Petri et vestri apostolatus
honorem suscepit tam nos quam sacros apices a summa sede delatos.”
With a certain class of English writers nowadays, it would seem to
have passed into a habit to talk about the independence of any country
they happen to be treating of from the See of Rome. If what each of

460 HADRIAN I.

that by the aid of the Pope’s prayers, they at length
reached England, and at once proceeded to the palace
of Offa, king of the Mercians. “Owing to his reverence
for Blessed Peter and your apostleship, he received with
great joy both us and the sacred letters we had
brought from the supreme See.” They then went into
Northumbria, where they found matters in a bad state,
“as they were the first Roman priests who had been
sent there since the time of Blessed Austin.” In a
council (probably at Corbridge-on-Tyne), in presence of
King Alfwold, the Pope’s letters to the Northumbrians
were read, and various canons (some twenty in number)
were proposed to the king and his prelates and nobles
for their acceptance. These canons had reference to
the frequent holding of synods; the careful teaching of
the faith “as it had been handed down to them by
the Holy Roman Church”; the election of kings;
the respecting of privileges granted to churches by
Rome; the abstaining from violence on the part of all
such as would keep “in communion with the Holy
Roman Church and St. Peter”; the abolition of the
practice of tattooing, of cruelty to horses, and eating
their flesh, etc. All engaged to keep these decrees,
with the aid of divine grace, to the best of their ability,
and the leading men confirmed the decrees by placing!

these authors have written were true, the Pope would not have had any
authority anywhere in the Middle Ages! Mr. Watts, who wrote Spain
in the Story of the Nations series, assures us (p. 158f.) that the Pope
had no authority in the early centuries of the Middle Ages in Spain.
Yet we find Hadrian (Cod. C., 95 G.) ‘giving licence’ to Wulchar, ‘the
archbishop of the province of Gaw/, to ordain Egila for Spain, “in
partibus Spaniensis provincie.” Abundant evidence has already been
given that the Pope had authority in Spain in the early Middle Ages.

* At least, so we understand “in manu nostra in vice dominii vestri,
signum sancte crucis formaverunt.” Some identify this Northern
council with that of ‘ Pincahala’ (Finchale, near Durham ?).

HADRIAN I. 461

their hands in the hands of the legates, as representatives
of the Pope, and making the sign of the cross on the
copy of the canons,

The letter then goes on to relate that the legates after-
wards returned to Mercia; and, at a council at Calcuith
(which Lingard supposes to be Chelsey), before Offa and
Jaenbyret (Lambert), Archbishop of Canterbury, read, “ both
in Latin and Teutonic that all might understand them,”
the decrees that had been approved of by the council in
Northumberland. “All with one accord, grateful for the
admonitions of your apostleship,” promised to stand by the
canons. In this synod King Offa, partly from hostility to
the men of Kent and to their archbishop, and partly from
motives of pride,1 tried to obtain from the council the recog-
nition of Lichfield as a metropolitan See. As might have
been expected, there was a stormy discussion.? But Offa
was determined, and he gained the bishops to his views.
Lichfield was acknowledged as the archiepiscopal See
of the country between the Thames and the Humber.
Jaenbyret’s possessions within the borders of Mercia
were seized by the king. Offa even managed to obtain
the consent of Pope Hadrian to his wishes. “ From
Pope Hadrian,” says William of Malmesbury,’ “whom he
had wearied with plausible assertions for a long time, as
many things not to be granted may be gradually drawn
and artfully wrested from minds intent on other occupa-
tions, he obtained (788) that there should be a bishopric
of the Mercians at Lichfield.” The Pope is even said,
but wrongly, to have sent the pallium* to the successor

1 These are motives assigned by Coenulf, Offa’s successor, and Alcuin,
to whom, nevertheless, Offa is “decus Brittanize, tuba preedicationis,
gladius contra hostes, scutum contra inimicos” (Ep. 64, ed, Diim.).

% Ang.-Sax. Chron., ad an. 785. 3 De Gest. Reg., i. § 86 seg.

4 7b, De Gest. Pont. L. iv., and L. i.; Mat. Paris, Chron. Maj, i.
p. 345, Rolls Series. On these affairs, cf Lingard, A.-Sux. Church,

462 HADRIAN f,

of the new archbishop, Higebert. It is interesting also
to note that at this council Offa gave into the hands of
the legates a deed by which he engaged that he and
his successors should each year give to St. Peter’s at
Rome 365 mancuses (a mancus = 30 pennies) to supply
oil for the lamps and for the support of poor pilgrims.

Pope Hadrian was also called upon to adjudicate—with
what result history does not inform us—between Offa and
some of his political opponents, who had fled to the court
of Charlemagne. In response to the repeated request of
Offa to have them delivered up to him, Charlemagne sent
them to Rome to have them tried before the Pope and
‘your archbishop.’ “For what,” wrote? the Frank to Offa,
“can be more satisfactory than that the apostolic authority
should decide cases in which there is difference of opinion ?”
What bloodshed would be avoided if this conduct of
Charlemagne were imitated by the great ones of to-day!
And the Frankish monarch had every reason to believe
that such a course could not be unacceptable to Offa, as
Hadrian had assured? him that Offa’s predecessors “had
ever been subject in obedience and faithful love to the
Pope’s holy predecessors.” —

i, pp. 72 and 113; and Hist. of England, i. p.78 ; Flanagan, Hist. of the
Church in England, i. p. 167f.; Héfélé, Conc., v. Haddan and Stubbs
(Ecclesiastical Documents, iil. p. 444f. and 524f.) show that Higebert
was the only archbishop of Lichfield. Charters bearing his name, as
archbishop, are found as late as 799.

1 In vit. Of@, ap. Wilkins, Conc.,i. This Zéfe is generally ascribed
to Matthew Paris (+1259), but it seems certain that it was already in
existence when Matthew wrote. It is also to be found in Wats’ ed. of
Matthew Paris (1640).

* Ao. Bouquet, Ker. Gall. Scrift., v.. or Haddan and Stubbs, iii.
496 f.

3 Cod. C., 92 G. where Hadrian remarks, “a praedecessoribus suis
regibus semper subjecti in obedientia atque fideli amore sanctis praede-
cessoribus nostris pontificibus et nobis existentes.” This letter is dated
789 by some authors.

HADRIAN 1 463

Other passages in the letter just quoted are nct without eae
interest as showing that the idea of having a Pope of ge
Frankish origin, and so presumably subservient to their
king, came into the fertile imaginations of the ‘Gauls’
before the days of Philip the Fair or Napoleon I. “You
write,” says the Pope, “that it has been reported to you that
we have been informed that Offa has written to suggest to
you that you should drive us from Our See and install
therein one of your own nation. You have further written,”
continues Hadrian, “to assure me that no such suggestion
was ever made by Offa, whose only wish is that my
paternity should be spared to govern the Church of God
to the advantage of all Christians.” However, the Pope
goes on to assure Charlemagne, he has not heard any
such reports about Offa, who could not, had he been a
pagan, have conceived such ideas; and, moreover, had he
heard them, he would not have believed them. And in
any case: ‘The Lord is my helper: I will not fear what
man can do unto me’ (Ps. cxvii. 6).

It will not be out of place here to dwell at some little Hadrian

andCharle-
length on some other of the relations between Hadrian magne,

and Charlemagne.

About a ‘thousand paces’ from the source of thei. The
Vulturno the traveller may behold the ruins of one of ee
the most famous monasteries in Italy during the Middle oa
Ages. Famous even in the eighth century, the monastery
of St. Vincent, on the Vulturno, was at the time of which
we are now writing in a most flourishing condition4
Founded in the midst of what was then a most wild
country, by the advice of that pious hermit, Thomas of
Morienna (who had been the originator of the equally
famous abbey of Farfa), and destined to be p!undered
over and over again by the Saracens in the following

1 “ Nunc magna congregatione refulget.” Paulus D., 7. L., vi. 40.

464. HADRIAN I.

century, it was in the reign of Hadrian full of monks,
We can easily understand how, in their hours of recreation,
the monks must have discussed the great changes which
were taking place in the government of Italy. A letter
of Hadrian, which tells us of a commotion in this abbey,
is in many ways the most interesting document of his age,
as it lets us see what men were thinking and saying with
regard to what was going on around them. A charge of
treason against the abbot of St. Vincent’s (one Potho) had
-been brought to the notice of Charlemagne. However, in
accordance! with the requirements of the canons, as the
case concerned an ecclesiastic, the king referred the matter
to Hadrian. The parties were duly summoned before a
court at Rome, at which, with the Pope, there sat as
assessors, archbishop Possessor the mzssus of Charlemagne,
the abbot of Farfa, and three other abbots, Hildeprand,
Duke of Spoleto, and various officials of the papal court
(nostris adstantibus servitits), such as the librarian Theo-
phylactus, Stephen the treasurer, Duke Theodore, the
Pope’s nephew, and many others. One of the monks,
Rodicausus (Rothgaud), stepped forward and said: “My
lord, when we had finished Sext, and, according to custom,
were singing the psalm—‘ Save me, O God, by Thy name’
—for the king and his family, the abbot suddenly stood
up and refused to sing. On another occasion, when we
were walking together, the abbot asked me: ‘What is
your opinion of our cause? I have been expecting a
sign in connection with it and have been disappointed,
If it were not for the monastery and its Beneventan lands,
I would count him (Charlemagne) as a dog. ... Would
that there were no more Franks left than I could carry on
my shoulder.”” To all this Potho indignantly retorted:
“Our congregation always prays for the king’s excellency
1 “Canonice et regulariter,” ep. 67 G., 68 /., of May-June 781.

HADRIAN I. 465

and for his children. And on the occasion referred to,
I rose, suddenly indeed, but merely to attend to some
business concerning the monastery. As for what was
said during our walk, it was simply this: ‘If it would not
seem like desertion of the monastery and its interests, I
would go to some place where I should not have to look
after anybody. Finally, with regard to the Franks, I said
nothing of what he alleges against me.” Rodicausus could
not bring forward any confirmatory evidence of his
allegations, and his charges were further discounted when
it was shown that he had been anything but an exemplary
character. After a most careful investigation, the abbot
was at length acquitted on his own oath, and that of ten
‘compurgators’ (five Franks by birth and five Lombards),
that he had never been ‘unfaithful’ to the king!

The words of Rodicausus, if unjustly placed by him
in the mouth of Potho, are an index of the independent
spirit that was abroad at this period in the Samnite
duchy, which was evidently too little in the power of
Charlemagne for him to have handed it over to the Pope
in its entirety, however much he may have wished to do so,
It was, in practice, as much distinguished from the kingdom
of Italy as the duchy of Rome and the Pentapolis.?

As we have already seen, Charlemagne not only con-
firmed the Pope’s supreme dominion over various parts of
Italy, but also restored to him the various ‘patrimonies’
which belonged to the Holy See, and had been seized
by the Lombards. But it was one thing for Charlemagne
to decree that these estates should be given back to the

1 Cf. ep-66°G.

2 Cf. a capitulary (95 n. 16, ed. Boretius, i. 201) of the youthful
Pippin, King of Italy (c. 790). “De fugitivis partibus Beneventi et
Spoleti sive Romaniz vel Pentapoli, qui confugium faciunt [in Pippini
regnum ex partibus Italia Pippino non subjectis, as the editor

expiains], ut reddantur et sint reversi ad proprium locum.”
VOL. 1 PY. Ui. 30

ii, The
restoration
of the ‘ pat-
rimonies.’

466 HADRIAN 1.

popes, and another for the popes to be able to get them
back from those who were in possession of them. Hence
Hadrian had a great deal of writing to do before he could
come into his rights in connection with some of them. In
five! letters of the Caroline Code do we find negotiations
between the Pope and the Frank king relative to the full
restoration of ‘the Sabine patrimony.’ Sometimes ‘perverse
and wicked men’ prevented even the envoys of Charle-
magne from being able to carry out their sovereign’s
orders. Three years elapsed before the restoration of
that patrimony was completely effected. There are also
extant, at least, three letters that treat of the full restora-
tion of the patrimonies of Roselle, near the modern Gros-
seto, and Populonium, a maritime city, on the Aurelian Way,
which had belonged ‘of old’? to the Holy See. For thus
trying to regain his just rights, the charge of avarice has often
been glibly thrown at Hadrian. But there is an avarice
which is no avarice. It is idle to accuse of avarice a man
who looks well after his own. And,as we shall see, no
man ever made a better use of the money that came to him
from the possessions of the Church than Hadrian. On one
occasion we find him indignantly denying that he acted
“from any® avaricious desire of acquiring even the cities
which Charlemagne had given to Blessed Peter and to him.”

1 Epp. 68-73 G. All this constant negotiation, as Allies (Peters
Rock, etc., p. 459) notes, “does not show that Charles was unwilling
to keep his word ; but it does show the difficulty of the matter. It was
_a great undertaking to pacify the population in a number of cities.”

2 Cod. C.,79 G. The Pope asks for the restoration of ‘fines,’ “sicut
ex antiquitus fuerunt.” Cf 2d., 80, In this letter he speaks of the
‘rights’ (justitiae) “de Populonio et Rosellas” (séc). Cf 84, 85. In
each case the Pope carefully distinguishes between the restoration of
the patrimonies, which had previously belonged to the Holy See, and
of certain cities of the duchy of Beneventum, which he asks for in the
same three letters. He asks that the cities be given over to him, as

they were included in Charlemagne’s ‘ donation.’
8) Cod. C,, Cora,

HADRIAN IL. 467

Other writers, again, accuse Hadrian of appealing to The ‘dona-
the ‘donation of Constantine’ in order to substantiate his oe
claims to dominion and patrimonies. This document rag
may be found in the principal collections of the councils.

It was received into the collection of the ‘ False Decretals,’
made by one calling himself Isidore, which appeared in
France about the middle of the ninth century. In it we
read that Constantine made over to the Pope not only the
city of Rome and the whole of Italy, but} all the provinces
of the West, and gave to the Roman clergy a great many
privileges of honour. It is, of course, now admitted on all
hands that the donation document is a forgery. But who
was the author of the forgery, or when exactly it first saw
the light, are questions which, if the truth be told, cannot
be completely answered. Those who are not well dis-
posed towards the popes give as early a date as pos-
sible to the composition of the donation, to insinuate,
at least, that it was by producing a forgery to the
Frank monarchs that the Roman pontiffs acquired their
temporal power. This action of writers hostile to the
popes causes authors who are attached to them to be
desirous of putting the date as late as possible. However,
of one thing we feel sure; no one who has attentively
followed the history of the growth of the temporal power
of the popes can believe that the so-called ‘donation,
produced, at the earliest, in the second half of the eighth
century, had anything to do with the acquisition of sove-

1 “Tam palatium nostrum, quamque urbem Romam, et omnes totius
Italize et Occidentalium regionum provincias loca et civitates . .
Sylvestro concedimus.” Déllinger, in his Papstfabelm (of which there
is an English translation by Plummer, and a French by Reinhard)
says that we ought to read “vel and not e¢ occidentalium,” etc. ;
thus limiting the donation to J/aly. But the next sentence of the
‘donation,’ which speaks of Constantine’s intention to transfer his rule,
‘ Orientalibus regionibus,’ clearly shows that the whole West had been
made over to the popes.

468 HADRIAN 1.

reign power by the popes in that century. The ‘donation
of Constantine’ no more gave a rood of territory to the
popes than the ‘False Decretals’ gave them a tittle of
spiritual power or ecclesiastical jurisdiction. In theory
or on paper the donation gave the Pope temporal
authority enough; but in point of fact it certainly cannot
be shown that it was the means of adding anything to
the practical jurisdiction of the popes. What gave the
popes their temporal sway in the eighth century was the
previous march of great events over which they had no
control, and not a trumpery piece of forged parchment.
And, as a matter of fact, when the popes’ already existing
temporal authority was extended by Pippin or confirmed
by Charlemagne, where do we find any mention of the
donation? It is indeed said that Pope Hadrian himself
appeals to it. That the reader may judge for himself
whether Hadrian did or did not cite the donation, we
will translate the whole passage1 which is supposed to
contain the allusion, Hadrian, after asking Charlemagne
to see to the fulfilment of all that he had promised to the
Church, continues as follows: “And as, in the times of

* It occurs in a letter of Hadrian to Charlemagne. Cod. C., 60 G.,
and Migne, Jaffé, 61. The passage of the Donation of Constantine,
which Hadrian is supposed to quote, is thus translated by Dr.
Hodgkin, /taly, etc., vii. 149: “We hand over and relinquish our
palace, the city of Rome, and all the provinces, places and cities of
Italy and [or] the western regions, to the most blessed Pontiff and
universal Pope, Silvester ; and we ordain by our pragmatic constitution
that they shall be governed by him and his successors” (V. su., n. 1;
p. 467). It should be noted that to quote the example of Constantine
was common with the popes (cf Greg. I, ep. v. 36); and Hadrian
himself, in his letter of Oct. 27, 785, to Constantine VI. and Irene,
hopes that they will show themselves a new Constantine and Helena
respectively ; and that when Hadrian speaks of the Western regions,
he calls them Hesferi@ partes. If he had had the Donation of Con-
stantine before him, it seems only natural to suppose he would have
written with it—-dartes occidentales.

HADRIAN I, 469

Blessed Sylvester, the Roman pontiff, the Holy Catholic
and Apostolic Roman Church of God was exalted by
the most pious emperor of blessed memory, Constantine
the Great, and power (potestas) was given to it in
these Western parts, so in your and our most happy times
may the Holy Church of God, zz, of Blessed Peter the
Apostle, exult. . . . because a new most Christian emperor
Constantine has arisen in these times, through whom God
has deigned to bestow everything on his Holy Church of
Blessed Peter, the Prince of the Apostles. Moreover, may
there be restored in your day all the other things which
have been granted to Blessed Peter and the Roman
Church by divers emperors, patricians and other God-
fearing men for the good of their souls and the pardon
of their sins, in Tuscany, Spoleto, Beneventum, Corsica
and the Sabine patrimony, and which have been in the
course of time filched away by the unspeakable Lombards.
We have sent, for the satisfaction of your Most Christian
Majesty! many of the donations which we have in our
archives in the Lateran.” In this passage, misled either
by the so-called ‘ Acts of Pope Sylvester,’ or, perchance, too
highly estimating the elevated position in the Western
world which the recognition of Christianity by Constantine
must have given to the See of Peter, Hadrian may have
exaggerated what Constantine effected* for the Holy

1 “ Plyyes donationes in sacro nostro scrinio Lateranensi reconditas
habemus, . . . . ad demonstrandum eas vobis direximus,” etc., 2d.

2 Some idea of what Constantine really effected for the bishops of
the West, and consequently particularly for the bishop of Rome, may
be gathered from the following passage of Eusebius (/7/2s¢. Eccles., x.
c. 2, Eng. trans.): “Epistles of the emperor were issued, addressed
to the bishops, with honours and superadded donations of monies ;
of which it may not be singular to insert extracts .... as we have
translated them from the Latin into the Greek language.” This
passage from Eusebius wonderfully confirms the lists of splendid
gifts to different churches in Rome, mentioned in the Lz/e of Pope
Sylvester (Z. P.) as given by Constantine.

470 HADRIAN I.

See. But there cannot have been question here of the
donation of Constantine. There would have been no
need, with such a donation (even if we limit it to Italy),
to send to Charlemagne ‘donations’ of ‘other emperors’
of patrimonies in Tuscany, Spoleto, etc. It is plain that
throughout this whole letter Hadrian is speaking of
donations of money, landed property and the like, ze, of
the patrimonies of the Roman See and not of its newly-
acquired regal sway over certain territories.

The donation, then, was not cited by a Pope before
the year 1054, when. Leo IX. quoted it in writing to
the patriarch Michael Cerularius. And we may say with
Fleury,' and others, that the first writer who cites it was
ffneas, Bishop of Paris, in a treatise? that he composed
against the Greeks, apparently about the year 867.
Hincmar of Rheims, and his contemporary Ado of Vienne,
are the next authors who mention the ‘donation’ From
this time forth, throughout the whole of the Middle Ages
to the fifteenth century, it was regarded as authentic by
both Greeks and Latins. Looking now at facts only, it
appears, in the first place, that most of the MSS. of the
‘donation’ are of Gallic origin, as also are the most ancient
of them. Fresh examination of the MSS. has apparently

1 Hist. Eccles., xi. bk. 51,n. 14. Gosselin, The Power of the Popes,
i. p. 317, etc.

2 Ap. dAchery, Sficileg. (1723), i. 113-148; Migne, P. Z,, t. 121.
“Cujus donationis exemplaribus ecclesiarum in Ged/Za existentium
armaria ex integro potiuntur,” c. 209, cited by Jungmann, Diss., Xxili.
It is a curious coincidence that whereas one A=neas was the first
author to quote the ‘donation’ as genuine, another, A=neas Sylvius,
afterwards Pius II., was the first to seriously call its authenticity in
question. (Cf. his Pentalog. de reb. eccles. et imp., ap. Pez, Thes.
anecd., iv. 3, p. 679). One of the earliest, and at the same time the
most solid, of the refutations of the genuineness of the donation was
from the pen of our own Reginald Pecock, Bishop of Chichester

(fifteenth century), in his Repressor of over much blaming of the Clergy.
3 Jungmann, D/ss., xxiil., vol. v. p. 25.

HADRIAN I. 47l

proved that the oldest copy of the deed, which is in the
Bibliothéque Nationale of France, was written in the ninth
century, and in the monastery of St. Denis. Further, though
it would have been very useful to such popes as Nicholas I.
and Hadrian II. in their controversies with Photius, it was
not cited by the Roman pontiffs till after the middle of the
eleventh century. But it was quoted by Gallic authors of
the ninth century. Why, then, should we not conclude that
it was forged among the Franks? A Frank would forge
it as a means of defending the institution of the Frankish
Empire against the diatribes of the Greeks. If Con-
stantine made Pope Sylvester supreme in the West, then
the popes could make over their rights to Charlemagne
and his descendants,

Whoever was the author of the donation (very likely, as
Grauert conjectures, a monk of St. Denis, near Paris, in the
first half of the ninth century), it may perhaps be said that
there is no convincing reason for believing that it saw the
light before the ninth century, or anywhere else than in
France. We may allow, however, with many modern critics,1
that it may have been forged about the year 774 in the
Lateran itself, and that it may have proved useful in later
times to the popes by furnishing them with a ready and
handy weapon for defending their rights to power they
had previously acquired. Still it assuredly cannot be shown
that they were ever able to add by its means to the territory
they already had—a remark equally applicable to the False
Decretals in the domain of the spiritual power of the popes.
As a matter of fact, too, the false donation was a document
not much used by the popes; and it certainly cannot be

1 Cf. Solmi, Stato e Chiesa, Modena, 1901, p. 12 f.

2 And so in unison with these views we find the conclusions of an
author who wrote on the Donation of Constantine, in the English
Historical Review, vol. ix. He points out (p. 632) that the popes
used the Donation very little indeed till the middle of the fifteenth

The Pope
appeals to
Charle-

magne (a)
for help to

enforce the ,

laws of the
Church.

472 HADRIAN IL

shown that it affected public opinion either in Rome or
elsewhere in the eighth century.

But not only in his temporal difficulties did ialtien
confidently turn to Charlemagne for help. It had come to
the Pope’s knowledge that various Lombard bishops were
in the habit of interfering with one another’s jurisdic-
tion; and that certain monks and nuns among the Lom-
bards had thrown off their monastic habits and contracted
illicit marriages. He therefore wrote to Charlemagne? to
beg him to co-operate with him, that such disorders “might
be canonically corrected in our and your times, among
the whole Christian people committed by God to our (the
Pope’s) care.” In a word, then, it may be said that these
two master minds of their age, Hadrian and Charlemagne,
always worked together in harmony.

This view, founded, it was believed, on a careful study of
the extant documents, from which it was possible to judge
of the intercourse of the Frankish king and the Roman
pope, had been written down long before the publication of
Dr. Hodgkin’s last volume of his most interesting /taly and
her Invaders. ‘When, however, the author of this view read
therein (p. 24): “The history of Italy during the quarter
of a century before us (the last quarter of the eighth) is
almost entirely the history of the strained relations between
the two men, Charles and Hadrian, who had sworn eternal
friendship over the corpse of St. Peter”—when he read
this, he not unnaturally wondered whether prejudice had

century, and then not “to enlarge their own territorial possessions,
but rather to dispose of lands newly acquired.” . . . “It is evident that
it was used by some popes to further their claims, but by rather fewer
than has been generally supposed. Apart from the doubtful cases of
Stephen (II.) II. and Gregory VII., only Urban II. and some of the
popes from Nicholas V. to Leo X. (1447-1521) derived a practical
benefit from the forged grant.”
1 Cod. C., 93 and94G. Cf 88 G,

HADRIAN I. 473

been at work and quite distorted his vision. He is content,
however, to stand by his opinion, as he finds that Mr.
Davis, the latest student in this country of the career of
Charlemagne, has no hesitation in writing (p. 164) that the
estrangements between the monarch and the Pope were
but “temporary .... were ripples on the surface; they
did not affect the broad stream of Frankish policy.” For _
in Hadrian’s own words (ep. 96 /.), “ it is my practice to try
to oblige you, as it is yours to endeavour to gratify me”;
and in Charlemagne’s (ep. 68 /.), “ your interests are ours,
and ours are yours.”?

Of course it is only to be expected that for their own
ends some would endeavour to disturb this harmony, and
that during their long intercourse some slight differences
of opinion or disagreements might arise between the Pope
and his powerful protector. The letters of the Caroline
Code prove that all this did really take place.

Two powerful officials (judtces) of Ravenna, who had (8) to re-

store to his
perpetrated divers excesses, and in consequence were in jurisdiction

dread of the Pope’s resentment, fled secretly to Charlemagne, jue of
trusting to make good their case by endeavouring to breed ;
distrust between the Pope and the king. Hadrian, how-
ever, writing? to Charlemagne and assuring him that he
does not think that anyone can sever their close friend-
ship, asks him not to show favour to these two wicked
men, but to send them to him in disgrace, that they may
be tried and punished, and so that the offering (0dlatzo), z.e.,
the donation, “made by your father Pippin and confirmed
by yourself, may remain intact.”
On another occasion, when a similar course had been (¢) not to

allow ‘ the

pursued by others of his Ravennese subjects, Hadrian Pope's
men to go

ete _,, tohim with-
1 Cf epp. 59 G. “In vinculo caritatis et dilectione nos adnecti,” out permis
sion,

and ep. 72, p. 603; 94, Pp. 633.
2 Cod. C. 75 G.

(d) against
the king’s
detention
of a legate
of the Pope.

474 HADRIAN IL

found it necessary to write+ in very plain terms to
Charlemagne. After pointing out that if honour is due
to the king’s ‘patriciate,’ so is it also due to ‘that of
St. Peter’—a form of speech used on this occasion only by
the Pope, Hadrian affirms that the ‘donation’ of Pippin,
which he here calls a holocaust, must be rigidly observed.
And if Charlemagne does not object to ‘his men,’ bishops,
counts or others, coming to the Pope, either to obey the
Pope’s orders or from their own free will; so neither does
the Pope object to his men going to the king, either to pay
him their respects or to seek justice. But as the king’s
men do not come ‘to the threshold of the apostles’
without the king’s permission, the Pope’s men ought not
to be suffered to approach the king without the Pope’s
permission. And he begs the king to exhort those of the
Pope’s men who come to him to remain subject to the
Pope, as he (the Pope) always exhorts those who come to
him from the king to remain steadfast in their loyalty to
their sovereign.

Strongly, too, had the Pope to protest against the
detention of one of his legates (a certain Anastasius,
the Pope’s chamberlain) by Charlemagne. The legate had
made use of some language (cmportabilia verba) which
the king could not brook, and had in consequence been
thrown into prison. Hadrian pointed out? that the
Lombards were boasting that such conduct on the part

1 Cod. C.,94 G. “Sicut vestri homines sine vestra absolutione ad
limina app. neque ad nos conjungunt, ita et nostri homines qui ad vos
venire cupiunt, cum nostra absolutione et epistola veniant.” The
independent sovereignty of the Pope is surely stated clearly enough
here.

* Cod. C., 51 G. If the order and dates assigned to the undated
documents of the Caroline Code by its latest editors, Jaffé and.

Gundlach, are correct, the Pope’s remonstrance must have produced
an immediate effect,as Anastasius returned to. Rome the same year

(775). Ep. 54 /» 53 G.

HADRIAN I. 475

of Charlemagne showed that the friendship between the
king and the Pope was at an end, that such action
was indeed wholly unheard of, and that the legate ought
to be sent back at once to the Pope, to be punished by
him according to his deserts.
On the death of Gratiosus, Archbishop of Ravenna (cy) egetaes
(778), ambassadors of Charlemagne were present at the sence ofthe

: ‘ 2 zs 4 ing’s
election of his successor. Against this Hadrian protested ! represen-
A i tatives at

as an uncanonical proceeding. the election

of the arch-

But, in general, as we have already insisted, there was bishop of
complete harmony of action and unbroken friendship ae
between the Pope and the king. At the request of the
latter, we find Hadrian ordering? the archbishop of Mutual re-

2 gard of
Ravenna to expel all Venetian traders from the Pope’s Charle-
5 z é A 2 magne an
territories in those parts; granting? him marbles and the Pope

p for each
mosaics from the exarch’s old palace at Ravenna, for other.

his church at Aix-la-Chapelle, and sending* him a copy
of the Sacramentary of St. Gregory, mathematical
and other masters,> and cantors to teach the Roman
chant.

These books and masters were wanted by Charlemagne as
aids for the furtherance of that literary Renaissance, which,
with the assistance of the practical Northumbrian Alcuin,
who showed himselt a skilled organiser, the enlightened
monarch was much more anxious to promote among his
subjects than he was to extend his regal sway over kingdoms.
Feeling deeply, and complaining in his capitularies (cap. 30)

1 Cod. Cx 85 G. 2 1b, 86 G.

3 7%, 81 G. Cf. Eginhard, zu vit. Car., c. 26. * Jb., 89.

5 Charlemagne fixed these at Metz. (Vit. Had., ap. Mab.) Ch
Monach. Sangall.,i.c.10, 11. This author, who has preserved scarcely
anything worth knowing, wrote about 883. He tells us stories about
Charlemagne’s throwing away the ‘green part’ of cheese, thinking it
was nasty, and having to be told it was the best part of the cheese !
Annal. Lauriss., ad an. 787, ap. M. G. SS., 1.171; John, the Deacon,
in vit. Greg. I, \. ii. 7-10.

476 HADRIAN I.

that the neglect of his predecessors had wellnigh resulted in
the extinction of learning, he made every effort to revive
it. He realised that there could be no civilisation without
religion and learning. In all this the Church, the Pope, went
before and along with the King. Charlemagne proclaimed
to the world (c. 769) that his first capitulary was issued at
the instigation of the Pope. Of his legislative enactments,
even those “dealing with commerce, education, the ad-
ministration of justice, seem to be inspired by contact with
Rome,” says his latest English biographer. “Each visit
to Italy was followed by important reforms in Church
or State. Sometimes the king returns with artists,
teachers, theologians in his train; more often we discern
that the general sense of responsibility as the custodian
of a great Christian society is quickened in him, by the
lofty ideas which Hadrian, greater in his words than in
his acts, communicated to the patrician of the Holy
See7ai(psrs 5).

If what the Frankish monarch accomplished in advanc-
ing the cause of learning were to be estimated by any
modern standard of actual results, it might be thought
he effected but little. But if it be measured, as it should
be, by what his labours afterwards made possible, then the
debt which European learning owes to him can scarcely
be overrated. He revived sound principles and ideas on
the subject of learning. It was again placed by him on
a pedestal, as something to be admired and imitated.
He proclaimed it the star by which men who would rise
to eminence in Church or State must be guided.

And if the learning which Charlemagne encouraged was
a culture which had reference for the most part directly
to the service of religion, it was at the time none the less
important. Nay, it was then on that very account but
the more important. The Teutonic rulers of Europe, at that

HADRIAN IL 477

time still rather wildly independent, had an instinctive
reverence indeed—as the Germans markedly have to this
day—for religion and its ministers, but for little else besides.
Civilisation and learning they could be only got to esteem,
in so far as it was connected with religion. However,
it is no part of our plan to go into the general question
of the Carolingian Renaissance. Still less is it our
business to enter into details on the subject. But as
the Annals of Lorsch and John the Deacon, the biographer
of Gregory the Great, give us very lively details on the
subject of the Roman Cantors taken to Francia by
Charlemagne, one is the less prepared to pass them over
in silence, as they show in what light the Frankish ruler
regarded Rome.

On the occasion of Charlemagne’s third visit to Rome The Gallic
(787), the services at Easter time brought out the prover- ee
bial jealousy of musicians. The Franks (Gadlz) declared
that their singing was more tuneful than that of the
Romans. The latter retorted that they rendered with
great exactness the Gregorian chants, which the Franks
simply murdered. When the dispute was brought before
Charlemagne it grew hot. “Relying on the presence of
their sovereign, the Franks loudly jeered the Romans,
who, trusting to their superior knowledge, promptly
dubbed their opponents fools and asses, and reckoned
that the teaching of St. Gregory was a rather better
guide than Gallic stupidity. To bring this sort of aimless
bickering to a point, Charlemagne asked his cantors
which was better and purer, the fountain-head or the
streams which flow at a distance from it. ‘The fountain-
head, was the unanimous answer. ‘Do you return then
to the fount of St. Gregory, for you have clearly corrupted
the music of the Church,” was the order of their king.
Accordingly when he returned to Frankland, he took

478 HADRIAN I.

with him two Roman cantors as well as two Gregorian
antiphonaries, which had been presented to him by the
Pope. Although, on account of what John, the deacon,
calls (ii. 10) ‘Gallic levity, it took some time to reform
the chant of the Franks, it was at length accomplished
through the zeal of the Roman tutors (who also taught the
Franks the organ), and through the capitularies (cap. 22,
30, 117) of the Frankish king. But, at the same time,
if the national prejudice of the Roman deacon could be
trusted, the result of these combined efforts cannot have
been very gratifying, zf the ‘beery throats’ of the Franks
were only made capable of producing noises “like the
sound of waggons rumbling over the stones—guasi
palusira per gradus confuse sonantia” (2b., 7)!

Also at Charlemagne’s request we find the Pope bestow-
- ing the pallium on Ermenbert,} Bishop of Bourges, and on
Tilpin,? Archbishop of Rheims ; and ordering? a three-days’
prayer of thanksgiving (¢7zduanas litanias) for the con-
version of the Saxons throughout his dominions. And
in return we find Charlemagne constantly doing favours
for the Pope and sending him presents of all kinds4—
crosses, horses, ‘strong and shapely’; wood and metal
for the church repairs that Hadrian was carrying on, and
money.

Their friendship for one another was further shown
by that especial sign of mutual esteem—the frequent
interchange of verses of their own composition. Some

1 Cod, G91 G.

* Flodoard, Hist. Rem., ii. c. 17, ap. Jaffé, 2410 (1845). This is the
‘Turpin’ whom the eleventh or twelfth century author of the romantic
history of Charlemagne assigned as the writer of his romance. Pope
Hadrian commissioned Tilpin to examine Lullus, Bishop of Mayence,
to see whether he also was worthy of the pallium. Flod., zd.

COG. Cin On.

* Cod. C., 79, 81, 65, 78 ; Eginhard, zz vit, Carneaa 7.

HADRIAN tf. 479

of those of Hadrian to Charlemagne have already been
quoted. Among those of Charlemagne to Hadrian mention
may be made of the dedicatory lines accompanying a
present of a copy of the Psalter in golden letters, which
Charlemagne had had prepared for the Pope. The king
(P. L., t. 98, p. 1349) begs the Pope’s acceptance of his
present—“ vile foris visu, stemma sed intus habens”; for
it contains the sweet songs of David. He gives it to him
that he may think of him when he touches it, and pray
for him. In turn he prays that the Pope may live long
to rule the Church by his dogmatic skill.

Hoc vobis ideo munus pie dedo sacerdos,
Filius ut mentem Patris adire queam.

Ac memorare mei precibus sanctisque piisque,
Hoc donum exiguum szepe tenendo manu.

Et quamquam modico niteat splendore libellus,
Davidis placeat celsa camcena tibi.

Rivulus iste meus teneatur flumine vestro,
Floriferumque nemus floscula nostra petant.

Incolumis vigeas, rector, per tempora longa
Ecclesiamque Dei dogmatis arte regas.

There is no need to pause to observe that this inter-
change of poetical presents, besides being an indication
of the mutual friendship of Pope and king, is a sign
of no little value of the expanding literary aspirations of
the times.

Charlemagne’s love for the Pope came out in strong Peath of
light on the death of the latter (December 25 or 26, 795). 795, and

ief of
“He wept for him,’ says! his biographer, Eginhard, “as ae

agne.
if he had lost the son or brother that was dearest to
him.” “And after he had ceased his mourning for

him, he begged prayers to be offered for him, and many
times sent alms to other countries for his benefit,”

1 Eginhard, zz vit. Car., c. 19.

480 HADRIAN I.

adds an old monastic chronicle? Of this ‘holy thought’ of
Charlemagne we have an interesting example in a letter
which he wrote? to our King Offa. In it he says that he
has sent presents to various episcopal Sees of England “as
an almsgiving on account of our apostolic lord Hadrian,
earnestly begging that you would order him to be prayed
for; not as doubting that his blessed soul is at rest,
but to show our esteem and regard for our dearest
friend.” Just before Hadrian died, Charlemagne was
preparing to send him a large share of the spoils he
had taken from the last stronghold of the robber Avars.
He was going to send it, as he told (Wom. Car., p. 355)
Pope Leo, to whom it was afterwards sent, that “the
greatness of the gift might show the strength of his love
for Hadrian, and that the steadfastness of their sweet
familiar intercourse might be made manifest to the eyes
of many.” He also, perhaps with the aid of Alcuin,
wrote the Pope’s epitaph,? which he caused to be inscribed
in letters of gold on black marble, and sent to Rome,
where it may still be read. The epitaph begins: “ Here
the Father of the Church, the glory of Rome, the
illustrious author, Hadrian, the blessed Pope, has _ his
rest. ... Born of noble parents, he was nobler by his
virtues. . .. The Church he enriched with his gifts, the
people with his holy teaching... . Rome, chief city of the
world, he re-erected thy walls. .. You were my dear
love, you do I now mourn. I join our names together,
Hadrian and Charles. I, the King; you, the Father. ...
With the Saints of God may your dear soul rejoice.”

1 Annal, Lauresh., ap. M. G. SS., i. 36.

2 Mon. Alc., Bib. Rer. Germ., vi. p. 286.

° Annal. Vit. Franc., ad an. 795; the epitaph (given P, L., t. 98,
p. 1350) is still to be seen in St. Peter’s, “built into the wall on the
left of - main entrance in the vestibule of the basilica.” (Gregorovius,
il, 460,

HADRIAN I, 481

The prosperity and the long peace which Hadrian
enjoyed enabled him to turn his attention to the needs
of his city itself. And to judge from the long list, given
in the Book of the Popes, of what he accomplished in
that direction it was evidently well that he did take up
the work, or the city would have fallen into ruin. In
what he accomplished as a builder he was quite a rival
of the fame of his great namesake, the Roman emperor.

He began first, it would seem, on the walls, which he
completely renovated. As he left them, they were of even
greater extent than the walls of the emperor Aurelian. For
the accomplishment of the work, the Pope brought together
men from the whole patrimony of the Church, from Tuscany,
Campania and the districts around Rome. These, with
the Romans themselves, encircled the city with a strong
wall defended by some four hundred towers, This work
cost! the Pope a hundred pounds weight of gold.

We have not space here to relate all that Hadrian,
whom his biographer calls ‘a lover of the Churches,’ did
in the way of rebuilding, repairing, redecorating and
refurnishing churches and cemeteries. The curious in this
matter will find the detailed account in the Book of the
Popes, or copious particulars in Miley or Gregorovius.
Among the many offerings which Hadrian made to

1 Z, P. The number of the towers, etc., with which the walls were
furnished was counted by a pilgrim to Rome about the year 800,
From the place where the MS. notes of this visitor to Rome were
found, viz., in the library of Einsiedeln, by the great Benedictine
scholar Mabillon, he is generally referred to as the ‘anonymous of
Einsiedeln” (Cf Mab., Vet. Analecta.) Cf. Miley’s Hist. of the
Papal States, i. p. 386f. Gregorovius (Rome, etc., il. p. 385), speaking
of this restoration, gives way to deductions drawn from ‘inner
consciousness.’ As there were no emperors to protect the antiquities
(like Constans II., doubtless !), “‘ portions of priceless reliefs and statues
must have fallen a sacrifice to the lime-kiln.” That, too, though we are
expressly informed in the Z. P. that ‘lime’ was one of the items of
great expense to the Pope.

NOL. 1. PT, I. 31

Hadrian as
a builder,

Churches,

Aqueducts,

482 HADRIAN I.

various churches for their decoration, we may instance,
as illustrative of much that has gone before, a crown
which he hung (774) before the tomb of St. Peter. He
caused it to be inscribed with some dozen verses, which
set forth that Our Lord, in His care for Church and State,
gave His sheep to Peter to tend, and he in turn handed
them over to Hadrian. The Roman patriciate He gave
to His faithful servants—to Charlemagne, who received it
from the bounty of Peter. It was for the king’s prosperity
that this crown was offered.!

To carry out his works, Hadrian spared no expense.
As the portico to St. Peter's running along the river from
the gate of the same name was too narrow for the
convenience of the people, the Pope resolved to build a
new one. Over twelve thousand blocks of travertine
were laid as a foundation in the bed of the river for the
new colonnade. Similar colonnades were constructed by
the Pope between the gates and the Churches of St.
Lawrence and St. Paul, both outside the walls. “ Very
great indeed,” is said by his biographer, “to have been
the number of workmen employed by the Pope.”

But of all the things most useful for the inhabitants of a
large city, there is nothing to equal abundant supply of
pure water. The Lombards, however, when they besieged
Rome in 756, under Aistulf, had done their best to deprive
the Romans of that priceless boon. The aqueducts were
in ruins. One of the first works undertaken by the

1 Some of the verses (with the emendations of De Rossi) run thus:
Tradit (Coelorum Dominus) oves fidei Petro pastore regendas,
Quas vice Hadriano crederet ille sua.

Quin et Romanum largitur in Urbe fideli
[Patriciatum] famuli[s], qui placuere sibi.
Qu[em] Carolus [merito] praecellentissimus [et] Rex
Susc[e]pit, dextra glorificante Petri.
Cf. Grisar, Analect. Rom., i. 85.

HADRIAN I, 483

Pope, after the fall of the Lombard kingdom, was to
repair (776) the Zrajana aqueduct, known in Hadrian’s
time as the Savatina from the fact that it conveyed the
water of the Sabatine Lake (Lago di Bracciano) to the
Janiculum. The words of the Pope’s biographer tell
his work in the matter of this aqueduct with some detail.
“For some twenty years (from the siege of 756) the
aqueduct—known as the Sabatina—and the leaden duct
(centenarium) that conveyed its waters to the atrium
of St. Peter’s, and to the baths close by (where our
brethren, the poor of Christ, come to receive alms and
to be washed at Paschal time), and by which the mills
on the Janiculum hill were worked, had been in ruins.
And as a hundred arches, and those of great height, had
been destroyed, there seemed to be no hope of the repair
of the aqueduct. The Pope, however, gathering together
a great many men, undertook the repair of the aqueduct ;
and such care did he expend upon it, and the renew-
ing of the leaden duct, that by the blessing of God the
water again flowed abundantly as it had done of old.”
Under the name of the Acgua Paola, this aqueduct still
supplies water to the same mills and to the famous
fountain of Paul V. The aqueduct, which bore the
name of /odia,1 and which had also been destroyed at
the same time as the Sabatina, was in like manner
renovated by the Pope. His vigorous hands also restored
the Claudia, which supplied the Lateran basilica, among
other places, with its water. With the aid of a great
host of men from Campania, the C/audia, the ruins of
which still form one of the most striking features of the

1 It was a branch of the Acqua Marcia (now the Acqua Pia), for the
supply of the baths of Caracalla, It crossed the Via Appia, over the
arch, wrongly called the arch of Drusus, near the Porta S. Sebastiano.
The name Jovia, or Jobia, was given to it from some restoration
effected by Diocletian (Duchesne, Z. P., i. 519).

484 - HADRIAN I.

Campagna near Rome, again refreshed the city with
its waters. Nor did the good Pope relax his efforts till,
by the restoration of the Agua Vzrgo, still in use, “he
had supplied almost the whole city with water by means
of that aqueduct.” In every age the popes and the
Catholic Church have ever gone on with courage, ever
fresh, erecting buildings to the honour and glory of God,
and for the benefit of mankind. And if a country is
dotted throughout its length and breadth with ruins of
such buildings, they have certainly not been destroyed
by Pope or priest.

Another effort made by the ,Pope for ameliorating
the condition of the people consisted in an attempt to
improve the cultivation of the Campagna. He continued
the work begun by Pope Zachary in founding ‘domus
culte’ or farm colonies. The Lzber Pontificalis gives
us the history of the foundation of six such institutions.
The one of them in which the Pope took the greatest
interest was called ‘Capracorum,” It was situated
apparently in’ the old territory of Veii, and was some
fifteen miles from Rome. The Pope had there inherited
an estate; and, after he had added to it very considerably
by purchasing various properties adjoining it, he formed
the whole into a farm colony. An extant inscription
shows that its people took part in the building of the
walls of the Leonine City under Leo IV. Broken up
in the eleventh century, its name still survives in Monte
di Capricoro and in the plain of Crepacore, near the
river Treia and the village of Campagnano. Its produce
the Pope assigned under pain of anathema to the perpetual
use of ‘our brethren the poor of Christ.2 For the

* Domus
cultee,’

17, P, “Tantam abundantiz aquam effudit (Virgo), ut pene totam
civitatem satiavit.”

2 “Quam domocultam Capracorum cum massis .... et omnibus

HADRIAN I. 485

use of the farm people, he built and “dedicated to
God his Maker, under the name of St. Peter,” a Church,
to which, with the greatest ceremony, attended by
his court and ‘by the Roman senate, he brought
a great many relics of the saints. With the profits
of this colony, the Pope ordained that at least one
hundred poor persons should be fed in the portico of
the Lateran, where were depicted on the walls various
pictures illustrative of alms given to the poor. Each
person received a loaf of bread, two glasses of wine, and
polenta (carnem de pulmento).

The last of the six ‘colonies’ was that of St. Leucius,
which Mastalus, the primicerius, left to the Pope for the
poor out of his hereditary estates, ‘for the good of his
soul.” This ‘colony’ was situated on the Flaminian
road, about five miles from Rome.

The Book of the Popes also tells of various Deaconries
for the relief of the poor which Hadrian founded and
endowed or improved in various parts of the city. By
his work in this direction, the number of these charitable
institutions was brought up to eighteen. And as to the
titular churches (in Hadrian’s time twenty-two) there
were already attached cardinal priests, so, later on
(towards the close of the eleventh century), cardinal
ei pertinentibus statuit per Apostolicum privilegium sub magnis
anathematis obligationibus, ut in usum fratrum nostrorum Christi
pauperum, perenniter permaneat.” Z. P. Further on we are told
that the anathema was published with the concurrence of the College
of Cardinals (una cum sacerdotali collegio). Of the remaining four
domus culte, two went by the name of Galera; and of these, one was
somewhat south of the modern village of Galera, and lay between the
great east road (Via Aurelia) and the Via Clodia, a branch of the Via
Cassia to Bracciano ; and the other has left a trace behind it in the
Ponte Galera station, six miles from Porto. The Domus C. Calvisianum
is placed at Solforata, some fifteen miles from Rome, between the Via

Ardeatina and the Via Laurentina. Close to the Calvisianum is found
that of S. Edisius.

Hadrian
coins
money.

486 HADRIAN I,

deacons were attached to the eighteen deaconries. We
can have no difficulty in believing the Pope’s biographer
when he assures us that Hadrian “arranged everything
usefully for the benefit of the poor.”

Whatever conclusions are come to with regard to the
alleged coining of money by popes Gregory III. and
Zachary, no one doubts that Hadrian I. at any rate caused
coins to be struck. Several specimens of his silver denarius
of unquestioned authenticity are to be found in the
Vatican collection and elsewhere. The series of papal
silver money begins with Hadrian. The extant examples
of his denarius show two types. The rarer type may be
said to correspond to the coins (?) of Gregory III. and
Zachary, even though its examples are round and of silver.
For as with the cozz of Gregory III., Hadrian’s coin of the
rarer type bears on the obverse a cross and the words
Hadrianus Papa, and on the reverse, divided by bars, the
words Sed Petrt. This striking similarity goes far to sup-
port the arguments for the genuineness of the cozus of
Hadrian’s predecessors. The coins of the other style were
evidently modelled on the type of money current in Italy
at the time. On the obverse is a bust of the Pope show-
ing, according to some, the head uncovered, with a crown
of hair (22. the crown of the tonsure), but no beard.
However, to the uninitiated, at least, it seems as if the
head were surmounted by headgear of some sort. On
either side of the bust there are the letters I B, of which
no one apparently knows the meaning. The words D N
Adrianus P P (Dominus noster Adrianus Papa) complete
the one side of the coin. The centre of the reverse is
taken up with a cross above two steps, and with the letters
R M (Roma), one on each side of it. Round the edge are

1 Very few of the other papal coins of the first series are stamped
with the bust of a Pope.

HADRIAN IL. 487

the words Victoria D N N (Domini Nostri), which refer to
Our Lord Jesus Christ. Below the cross are the letters
CONOB, the meaning of which is so much disputed.
The best signification, perhaps, which has been given to
these letters is the following, taken from Cedrenus :—
Civitates Omnes Wostrzee Obediunt Benerationi

These denarii are often spoken of as ‘ grossos’ (said to be
so called because they are equivalent in value to a number
of smaller coins), and are worth five ‘ bajocchi, or about
threepence. They were the most valuable coins then in
common circulation in Rome. They are of the size of our
sixpence, but somewhat thinner.?

Hadrian was buried in the Church he had done so
much for—the basilica of St. Peter’s—on the day after
his death, ze, on December 26, 795.

After the eloquent facts we have narrated of the life
of Hadrian, there will surely be no need of expending
many words in setting forth in express terms the char-
acter of this pontiff, one of the greatest who have adorned
the chair of Peter. '

For does not, for instance, the plain declaration of
his rights, whether spiritual or temporal, before prince
or bishop, proclaim the calm courage of the man? No
one will fail to have noted that he was not slow in
standing out for his temporal rights? as well with

1 Cf. Pizzamiglio, Prime monete papali, p. 42. With good reason, in
our opinion, does he believe that the money of the rarer type belongs
to the short period of Hadrian’s reign before the downfall of the Lom-
bard kingdom ; the rest to the time when the victories of Charlemagne
had made his position secure.

2 Cf. Cinagli, Monete, etc., p. 2; Promis, Monete det R. P., p. 32;
and Pizzamiglio, /.¢c., p. 38. The last-named author supplements even
Promis to some extent.

3 He will not have his subjects going off to Charlemagne w7thout
his leave, even if they only go to say what is good of him. “Sed
neque eis neque quolibet homini nullatenus in nostra adversitate

Buried in
St. Peter's.

Character
of Hadrian.

488 HADRIAN I.

Charlemagne as with Constantine and Irene. In matters
of spiritual jurisdiction, too, he was certainly no less firm.
He would not have Charlemagne interfere in the election
of the archbishops of Ravenna, and in set terms ex-
plained his position among the bishops of the world to
the Frankish monarch. “There is no one but knows
how great authority has been granted to Blessed Peter,
the Prince of the Apostles, and to his most Holy See,
so that it has the right of giving authoritative decisions
in every case; and no one has any right to override its
sentences. The See of Blessed Peter has the right of
loosening whatever may be bound by the decisions of
any bishops at all, through whom the care of the
Universal Church is referred to the one See of Peter, and
every member is kept joined to the Head.” Mullinger,
indeed, thinks this passage is an interpolation, as it is
too papal in tone! No further notice will be taken of
this groundless thought than to observe that such con-
jectures are equally competent to do away with the
whole Codex Carolinus, and then to support the said
passage by a second from another letter of Pope
Hadrian published by Hampe.? The letter is addressed
to Maginarius, the abbot of St. Denis, to whom the
Pope had granted some privilege (no doubt as a recog-
nition of his services when acting as one of Charlemagne’s
misst to Rome), which had been attacked, among others,
by the powerful bishops of Milan and Aquileia. “It is

preeberemini consensum ; sed statim, si tales repperissetis, et hominem
et causam ad nostrum judicium mitteremini.” Ep. 98 /., to Charle-
magne.

* The author of The Schools of Charles the Great, London, 1877.
Needless to say the latest editor of the Codex Car., Gundlach, makes
not the slightest allusion to the want of authenticity of any part of this
letter (98 7., 94 G.). His ed. is as late as 1892.

4M. G. EDDp., Vv. p. 1.

HADRIAN I. 489

plain, from the tradition of the Fathers, that it (the
Holy Roman Church) holds the chief place (Jrincipatum)
in the world. This position, obtained by the word of
the Lord, the Blessed Apostle Peter has ever held and
still holds, and it is acknowledged to be his by the Church
(ecclesia nihilhominus — sic — subsequente). If, then, the
Churches of Constantinople, Alexandria and Antioch are
subject to the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman
Church—the more that it was by the consent of the
same Roman Church that the Church of Constantinople
obtained the second rank, and that the Churches of
Alexandria and Antioch, which had previously been
above the Church of Constantinople, did not presume
to resist after the Roman Church, their head, had given
its assent—what are those unhappy and wretched pseudo-
bishops going to do, who, resisting the privileges of the
Holy See, as your holinesses have done, rob themselves? ”
Whether this letter seems papal in tone or not, its editor,
Hampe, assures us that its authenticity has been demon-
strated, and that, as his references? show, its substance
was, after all, proclaimed by Pope Gelasius I. in 495.
What need to say Hadrian was charitable? His was
a charity that would stand test. For he was not con-
tent with giving alms to the poor, which to a rich man
may be no great sacrifice, but he gave his personal ser-
vices, which to people in position costs a great deal
more. Was the city of Rome devastated by an extra-
ordinary flood of the Tiber (December 791)? The Pope

1 With the assertion of Hadrian that the See of Constantinople
took the second place among the patriarchs, with the consent of |
Rome, Hampe compares a similar assertion of Gelasius (ap. Jatfé,
664). Ch ep. 92 G. “Nos... . sedem apostolorum adepti, vice
b. Petri... . tenentes atque cuncto populo christiano (séc) nobis a
Deo commisso regentes, non ab hominibus neque per hominem electi
sumus, sed per J. Christum vocati.”

490 HADRIAN I.

was not content with praying for its cessation, prostrate
on the ground, but he took provisions in boats to those
who, by reason of the depth of the water, could not leave
their homes. And when the flood had subsided, the
Pope went to visit in their houses those who had suffered
most, to console! them. Did he hear of a fire in the
city, he was there, though it were ‘first thing in the
morning, working away endeavouring to extinguish the
flames When we recall his prompt restoration of law
and order in Rome on his accession, his successful
struggle with the Lombards, and with heresy in the
East and West, his gigantic works undertaken for the
renovation of the city, his coining of money,? and
generally his labours in the direction of fixing the
extent of papal rule in Italy and of settling its system
of government in more or less newly-acquired territory,
what necessity can there be to dilate on his vigour,
energy and promptness of action? And his zeal was
in accordance with both knowledge and prudence. His
piety was of the solid kind that “prays as though
everything depended on God, and works as though every-
thing depended on oneself.” His amiability was such
that he was as much the friend of the great Frankish
sovereign as of the poor of Rome. In an age when it
is the fashion with many to consider that all in the
Middle Ages were superstitious, it may be well to note
that Hadrian writes to praise Charlemagne for holding
of no account the visions of a certain monk of the
name of John (ep. 88). ‘In talent and education’ he
was ‘the foremost man in Rome.’ To Charlemagne’s

1 LZ. P. “Postmodum vero arefacta aqua, omnes ex ipsa regione
Via Lata (which had suffered most) in domo consolatus est.”

* See what is said in the Z. P. of the exertions of the Pope in the
case of a fire at the Church of Anastasius.

3. sup., p. 486.

HADRIAN I. 491

poetical letters he “sometimes replied! in verse; and
specimens of these poetic effusions still remain. Written
in acrostics, they are neither in expression nor metre
below the level of their time.”

Looking back for a moment at the popes of the eighth pe Bone
century, we have to gladden our sight the lives not only eighth
of good men, but even of men at once good and great, pert
Gregory II., “one? of the brightest characters of modern
history,” Zachary, and Hadrian were men who stand out
in beautiful relief in the history of the age in which
they lived. The true greatness of Hadrian was not
dimmed even by the glory of Charlemagne, perhaps the
only really great lay sovereign of the age. The non-
Catholic author last quoted says® of the popes of this
period, that they “appear to have merited their elevation
by their virtues; and, deserted by the feeble court of
Constantinople, the Romans withdrew their respect and
confidence from the emperors to repose their obedience
on nearer protectors.” 4

The last proposition of the preceding quotation naturally The princi-

pal event of

leads us to emphasise the acquisition of temporal power the iene
cen °

by the popes as the event of the most far-reaching
consequence in this century of their history. After two
centuries of what we may describe as anarchy in Italy,

1 Gregorovius, Rome, li. p. 414.

2 Such is the language of even Col. Proctor, Azst. of Italy, p. 11.

3 Hist. of Italy, p. 1.

4 With this, compare the causes of the temporal power (“ Estimation
of those who were so often its (Rome’s) preservers”) enumerated by
the Jewish writer Sugenheim, quoted by Allies, Peters Rock in
Mohammeds Flood, p. 425—a work the writer of these pages only
came across when he had completed this volume. The work of
Mr. Allies, just quoted, gives, from a very thorough analysis and
comparison of the facts of the history of the period, a very lucid
statement of the position of the popes in Church and State during
the existence of the Lombard kingdom, and of the causes that brought
that position about.

492 HADRIAN I.

the popes emerge as rulers of a very considerable part
of it. The powerlessness and tyranny! of the exarchs
and the eastern emperors, and the lust of territory on the
part of the savage Lombard, on the one hand, and the
beneficent conduct of the popes on the other, were the
true cause of the acquisition of sovereign power in temporals
by the popes. And here we cannot refrain from quoting
in this connection a few eloquent words from Diehl.
In his /ustinien, a work as attractive and instructive
from the number and beauty of its carefully selected
illustrations as valuable from the excellence of its matter
and the grace of its style, he writes (p. 627) thus of
the popes of the sixth century: “In everyday life it
was the Church which, from the products of its rich and
admirably-managed estates, supported the city: by the
hospitals which it built, by the works of charity which it
multiplied, by its daily and inexhaustible beneficence, it
was the Church which reanimated and consoled the
wretched ; and so, in that Rome which it defended and
kept alive, slowly did it prepare and legitimatise the
authority it was one day to exercise therein. Under the
rule of Justinian, indeed, it had cruel experience of the
rigour of imperial despotism; but the day was to come
when the Roman pontiff would (for ever) free himself
from the grasp of the Czsaro-papism of Byzantium.”
Even before the close of the sixth century that day had
already dawned. The first Pope of whom we have written,
the great Gregory, was already practically independent
of Constantinople. Hadrian, with Charlemagne as his
protector, was, in right and in fact, lord and master both
at Rome and Ravenna. It was no longer Ravenna that
sent to Rome its civil and military officials, its judices,

1 Cf Hist. Universelle, i. p. 199, by Lavisse and Rambaud, authors
who have no Catholic sympathy.

HADRIAN I. 493

magistrt militum, and its dukes. But it was the Pope
who set over Ravenna its archbishop as its ruler in
temporal as in spiritual concerns, who sent thither his
dukes and his counts, his jwdices and his actores, who
there with authority settled all matters which came up
for consideration.2, Equally absolute was the civil juris-
diction of Hadrian within the City of Rome. It is true
that there were to be found therein the most notable of
the institutions of antiquity. But it was rather that their
names were heard on the lips of men than that their
power and influence really survived. Ifthe greatest of the
Goths (Theoderic) infused new life and honour into the
Senate, it was extinguished in the blood of the senatorial
families by a revengeful successor, who felt that his nation
was being crushed for ever by the Roman general Narses.
Hence have we already heard the great Gregory bewailing
its disappearance. And if from time to time in this
history we have come across ¢he senate, it can only have
been at most a kind of municipal council, and it was
probably, during the two centuries of which we have
written, only a name for the class of the nobles.’

In the same way, during the pontificate of Gregory I
as during that of Hadrian,’ we encounter the prefect of the
City. But before the days of Gregory, Boéthius could
lament that in his time the prefect was but an empty

1 At least that is the general opinion. In the dearth of documentary
evidence with which we have to contend, this point cannot be said to
be quite certain. Cf. Cod. C., ep. 86 G.

2 Cf. 2b. ep. 49 G., the most important authority on this point.
“ Judices ad faciendas justitias direxit.” Cf also epp. 55 and 75.

* Hence Paul J. (Cod. C., ep. 24 G.) could offer to Pippin the
salutations of the three orders —the clergy, the nobility, and the
people in general. “Salutant (vos) cuncti sacerdotes . . . . et cunctus

procerum senatus atque diversi populi congregatio.”
4 Ep. ix. 16, al. x.6. “Gloriosissimus Johannes przefectus Urbis.”

6 LZ. P. in vit. Had., §§ 13, 63.

494 HADRIAN T.

name! In the days of Hadrian his jurisdiction was
limited by the ruling authorities among both the clergy
and the military, by the primicerius, secundicerius and
the others, soon to be known as the judices de clero or the
palatine judges,2 on the one hand, and by the magzstri
nilitum and the dukes on the other; and was apparently
confined to dealing with criminals who did not belong to
either the clerical or military circles,

Though, then, for the time, the popes at the close of the
eighth century were free from all external control, whether
in the city or out of it, they were not free from trouble.
It is with the popes as with us all, we get rid of one
trouble only to be assailed by another. Their difficulties
were henceforth for many ages to spring largely from
within, from the aristocracy. Now that the popes had
extensive temporal sovereignty, it was only natural that
the great families of Rome should use every means to get
the power of the Papacy into their own hands and to
keep it there. And they did! The violent action of
Duke Toto on the death of Paul I. is only an earnest of
much worse to come, Still, even with the certain assur-
ance of bringing fresh difficulties upon themselves, it was
only to be expected that the popes would not tamely
endure the oppression of Pavia and Constantinople.

Submission to the Lombards was not to be thought of.
If the Italians instinctively hated the Goths, “the most
enlightened of the barbarians,”* they and the Romans

1 “Magna olim potestas, nunc inane nomen est,” iii, Pros. iv.;

quoted by E. Rodocanachi, Les Jnstitutions Communales de Rome
sous la Papauté, Paris, 1901,

* The falatinus ordo is spoken of by Leo IV., c. 853, ap. WZ. G.
Eff, v. 599.

* “Indigenz .... maxime odissent Gothos,” Procopius, De dello
Goth., i. c. 8.

* “Unde et pene omnibus barbaris Gothi sapientiores semper
extiterunt,” Jornandes, De rebus Geticis, c. 5.

HADRIAN I. 495

especially abhorred and detested the Lombards. They
were an altogether impossible nation for a people with
ever so little civilisation to live under. Up to the very
end of their sway in Italy they waged war with as much
barbarity as they did when they first descended upon the
peninsula. The binding obligation of an oath they never
understood. Such improvement as had taken place
among them was, of course, due to the teachings of Chris-
tianity, which seems to have been adopted by the nation
at large during this century. The Christian influence
brought to bear by the popes on their legislation, and on
that of other Western peoples, is an argument of the
beneficent power of the Papacy, at once as striking and
irrefragable as free from declamation. In reforming
the marriage laws, Liutprand avers:1 “This ordinance
have we made because, as God is our witness, the Pope
of the city of Rome, who is the head of the Churches of
God and of the priests in the whole world, has exhorted
us by his epistles in nowise to allow such marriage (with
a first cousin’s widow) to take place.”

It has been truly said that the temporal power of the
popes is the only example in history of the acquisition of
such power without arms, and of its preservation without
violence. Well was it for the world that Rome was not
overcome by the Lombards, and that it passed from under
the sway of the tyrannical East to the. paternal, often too
paternal, rule of the popes. With the conquest of Rome
by the Lombards, civilisation and Christianity, in the West
at least, would have been, if not quite destroyed, yet
certainly retarded for many a decade of years. For
if Italy and Rome, even in that age a source of light to

1 Leg, |. vid, ap. &.d.S. i. ptoii, 1 have used the translation of
Hodgkin, J¢aly, etc., vi. 394. Cf. Capit. 19, ed. MZ. G. HZ. (Boretius 1,
p. 44), of Charlemagne.

496 HADRIAN IL

the West, had been reduced to the direst extremity by
the Gothic wars; if ‘to bend the rigid minds of the
Goths’! the wretched remnant of the Italian people had
been brought to the verge of financial ruin, still, no doubt,
even under a Greek exarch, matters would have gradually
improved. For, on the close of the Gothic war, Justinian
not merely boasted that he had freed Italy from ‘the
tyranny,’ had restored to it ‘perfect peace, and had taken
all the needful steps to repair ‘its disasters,” but he
erected such monuments in Ravenna and other places
as to furnish models calculated to raise the standard of
art. But to ‘the extraordinary decadence’ in ‘all Art,
which had begun during the Gothic campaigns, the
Lombard conquest ‘immensely contributed.’ One result
of the victories of Belisarius and Narses had been the
introduction, along with Greek influences generally, of
Byzantine Art. And with the distress caused by the
Lombards, Italy and Rome had to be content with the
poorest productions of that Art. For there was nothing
there at this period to tempt the Greek artist to leave
Constantinople; on the contrary, there was every reason
to make him keep away from it, “because Italy was then
a synonym for ‘land accursed and desolate’; Italians for
miserable impoverished slaves, and their rulers for igno-
rant, avaricious, cruel barbarians, destructive of the very
elements of civilisation.”* The famous letter of Agatho
to Constantine Pogonatus shows how much the popes re-

? An inscription by Narses, cited by Diehl, Jzestinien, p. 200.

* Justinien, p. 200, citing the emperors MVovels and Pragmatic
Sanction.

® Architecture in Italy, from the sixth to the eleventh century, by
R. Cattaneo, London, 1896. This decadence, we are assured, lasted
till the end of the ninth century, and in some parts of Italy even later,
even till into the eleventh century.

Selo De 276

HADRIAN IL 497

gretted this decay in the arts and sciences of civilised life.
All that mer could do to arrest it, that they did. What
is the Book of the Popes but a list of works undertaken by
the popes in every department of art? From the days of
Gregory to those of Hadrian I. they sent forth books and
masters to the whole West; and to Rome, in search of
all that a zeal for increased civilisation could make men
desire, came monks and princes from the furthest bounds
of what was then called ‘the parts of the Hesperiz.’
Civilisation in the West would have been dealt a fatal
blow had the Eternal City fallen beneath the sway of the
ferocious Lombard.

And had Rome remained under the control of the
despots of Constantinople, its patriarchs, the popes, the
great upholders of liberty of conscience, would have
been as much ecclesiastical puppets as the patriarchs of
Constantinople. And, humanly speaking, there would,
moreover, have been in the Chair of Peter, as there were
in the See of Constantinople, patriarchs as ready, at the
will of a proud or ignorant emperor, to do all that lay in
their power to play fast and loose with the sacred doctrines
of the Blessed Trinity and the Incarnation, as to smash
images. But, by the decrees of God, Who watches over
His Church, “the snares were broken” and the popes
were freed. Freed as well from the Lombard as from
the tyrants at Constantinople."

1 “ Aucune vexation, aucune humiliation n’était épargnée 4 PEglise
romaine” by their representatives the Exarchs of Ravenna, says Diehl,

Ladminist. byzant., p. 184.

VOLat. BE, it 32

APPENDIX.

THE TWO LETTERS OF GREGORY II. TO THE
EMPEROR LEO III. ARE THEY GENUINE?

Tuat Gregory II. did write to Leo on the subject of his
Iconoclastic decrees is undoubted. It is expressly stated by
Theophanes, and by the Book of the Popes,1 when we are told
that Gregory III. addressed ‘admonitory letters’ to Leo, “with
all the authority of the Apostolic See, as his predecessor of
blessed memory had already done,” to withdraw him from his
errors.

Now there are extant two letters of acknowledged comparatively
satisfactory MS. authority, purporting to be the very letters actually
written by Gregory II. It is allowed, therefore, by those who
deny the authenticity of these letters—e.g., by Dr. Hodgkin 2— that
“‘we may without any constraint either way from documentary
testimony turn to consider the internal evidence afforded by the
contents of the Epistles.”

Turning, then, to the letters themselves, is there anything in
them that tells for their being genuine? There is. The historical
facts alluded to in them, such as the destruction of the famous
image of Our Saviour at Constantinople, the length of Leo’s
reign (ten years) before he began his Iconoclastic campaign,
etc.,8 are in harmony with those related by documents of certain

1 In vit. Greg. III., ad znzt.

2 Jtaly, etc., vi., p. 502.

® The letter mentions the capture of Ravenna by the Lombards.
Now, while it is certain that it was captured by them adovwt this time,
the exact date of its capture cannot be assigned from any of the
sources at our disposal. It cannot, however, be proved that it did not

take place about 727, viz., the time indicated by this letter of Gregory.
498

APPENDIX 499

authenticity. And, what is more important, ‘several of the
arguments used”?! by Gregory, in addressing the synod of 727,
“have so great a similarity with some passages of the two letters
of Gregory to the Emperor,”? that it is hard to resist the
conclusion that the author of the address and the letters are
one and the same. Again, in the same connection, Theophanes
states that in the ‘doctrinal letters’ which Gregory wrote to
Leo, the Pope pointed out that “the emperor ought not to issue
any ordinances in regard to the faith, and ought not to alter the
ancient dogmas” . . . . and also ‘censured’ and ‘reprimanded 8
the Emperor Leo for his impiety.’ The two letters in question
are well summed up in the above words of Theophanes. They
certainly reprimand the emperor, and the words: “It is not
the business of the emperor to publish decrees concerning the
faith, or to alter the old doctrines,” not only are to be found
verbally in the two letters, but they form the leading thought
inthem. It was the strong tone of the letter which impressed
itself on the mind of the author of the Liber Synodicus (ninth
century). He says that the Pope addressed to the emperors
arguments at once numerous and powerfully expressed—edéyxous
moddois Kat opodpois xpyodpevos (ap. Labbe, vi. 1462). Finally,
the letter of Gregory to Germanus, which is certainly genuine, as
it was read in the Seventh General Council, has a strong family
likeness with the disputed letters. Possibly it was selected to be
read in preference to the others, out of deference to Constantine
and Irene, as it is certainly less severe on Leo than the others,
though it also says some strong things about him. All, then, that
we know of or might infer as to the contents of the letters of
Gregory is to be found in the two letters that we now have. So
much for the positive arguments for their authenticity.

With regard to the arguments urged against their genuineness,
some have been answered in the text. The chief one is the
alleged coarseness of their style. Here it may be observed that any
want of politeness there may be in the Greek version of the letters,
such as we now have them, is certainly aggravated by the way

1 And cited by Pope Hadrian I. in a letter to Charlemagne (ap.
Mansi, xiii. 759)-

2 Héfélé, v. 302, Eng. trans. at By

8 The L. P., sub fin., uses the phrase “scriptis commonult.

500 APPENDIX

in which they have been, by some writers,! rendered into English.
As far as we can judge, the most ‘spicy’ passage in the two
letters is the one where the Pope points out to Leo that he
is a laughing-stock even to the children, and that if he were to
go into one of their schools, the little ones would throw their
tablets at his head, should he tell them he was the persecutor
of images! “And so,” adds Gregory, “you will learn from the
foolish what the wise could not teach you.” It was, of course,
absolutely necessary for the Pope, if he would produce any effect
on the rough, rude, uneducated Leo, to write to him in a very
different strain to what his courtly namesake wrote to Maurice.
And, moreover, the times themselves had become rougher; and
the popes, as we have seen, had received scant courtesy from
the emperors in many instances since the days of Gregory I.
Further, to make ruler and subject, there must be a reciprocity
of duties. And the fact that the emperors had been unwilling
or unable to show themselves guardians of their people in Rome
had of course deprived them of any right to their obedience. And
hence we might expect a very different letter from a practically
independent ruler, as Gregory II. was, than from his great
predecessor. If these reflections are borne in mind, and no
unnecessary force given to.the original by translation, the letters
will at most only be set down as strong and straightforward—
though certainly blunter than any previously addressed to Con-
stantinople from the papal chancery.

Some of the other objections to the letter are trivial. It is
objected that Ozias is made to destroy the brazen serpent
instead of Ezechias,? and David to bring the brazen serpent into
the Zemple, whereas it is true the temple profer was not then
built. Forgers do not make mistakes such as the above.

With regard to difficulties from statements of fact, the
chronological note at the beginning of the Pope’s first letter
is urged as an objection. According even to our opponents’

1 E.g.. by Dr. Hodgkin. For instance, rafcov may well be trans-
lated ‘Shut up!’ in one of Lucian’s dialogues ; but there is not the
slightest need, with Hodgkin, to translate it so in these letters of
Pope Gregory—the less so that, in one case, the words immediately
preceding are, “Give ear to our lowliness.”

2 See page I9gI, note 2.

APPENDIX 501

way of reading the statement,! all that can at best be urged is
that it is zmprodable that Leo would write on theological matters
to the Pope from his camp where he was proclaimed emperor.
But the ‘¢heological matters would simply be a declaration of
his orthodoxy in a letter which Leo might very well write to the
Pope to inform him of the claim he was making to the throne.
Duchesne (i. 414) further objects that the place where the
emperor's letters are preserved is set down in this letter as ‘the
confession of St. Peter,’ and not the archives of the Vatican.
But as it was not an uncommon practice at this period for the
popes to lay important letters on the confession of St. Peter
(fF, eg., Cod. Carol, ep. 45, ed. Gundlach), it may easily have
been that, at least for a time, such letters may have been
preserved in some receptacle on or near the confession2 And
when the same learned author asks who does not see, under the
name of Septetus (a Western prince who is stated in the
first letter of Gregory to have desired the Pope to come and

1 If the passage be taken as Héfélé reads it (v. 300, Eng. trans.), the
said statement only strengthens the arguments for the genuineness of
the letters. ;

2 That such was in fact the practice is asserted by that distinguished
scholar, the late Paul Fabre (+1899). In a paper on La Bibliotheque
Vaticane, mserted in a recent publication (Le Gouvernement del’ Eglise),
he says: “Depuis longtemps lusage s’était introduit de conserver
auprés de la Confession le texte des engagements qu’on prenait envers
PApétre, tels que les professions de foi des papes et des évéques, les
donations faites a S. Pierre,” etc. (p. 183). It is most interesting to
find our own Ceolfrid, the successor of S. Benet Biscop (cf sup., p. 83),
dedicating a book to the confession of St. Peter. He had caused three
copies to be made of a bible “ which he had brought from Rome, one of
which, on his return to Rome in his old age, he took with him as a gift,”
says Bede (Vit. abbat., n. 15; cf. De sex. etat., an. 720). This ‘ gift’ of
Ceolfrid still exists. It is the famous so-called Codex Amiatinus. By
the skill of De Rossi the text of its dedication “to the venerable body
of S. Peter” has been restored. It runs:

“Corpus ad eximii merito venerabile Petri
Quem caput Ecclesize dedicat alta fides
Ceolfridus Anglorum extremis de finibus abbas
Devota affectus pignora mitto mei.”

Fabre, who quotes this (p. 182), says: “As the present of Ceolfrid
was principally intended as a mark of gratitude and devotion to the
Apostle, it was hence destined for his tomb” (p. 183).

“502 APPENDIX

baptise him), an imaginary king of Sef/as, that is to say, of
Ceuta, which to a Byzantine forger would represent the most
out-of-the-way corner of the West—it must be answered that
the connection is not acknowledged by all. For some see in
Septetus a possible German chief converted by St. Boniface.
Though the Roman fortress ‘Ad Septem Fratres’ used in
ancient times to occupy the site whereon is now the Spanish
town of Ceuta, or Sebta, and though this was often called szmply
Septem, by the time that Gregory II. became Pope it had fallen
under the power of the Saracens and was known as Sebta. It
seems to the last degree fanciful to suppose that a Greek forger
at Constantinople would fix upon such an out-of-the-way place,
which would not naturally be before his mind at all, and then
coin an imaginary name from it. A forger would surely find
out a real name of some heathen prince.

Finally, Gregory speaks of Iconoclastic disturbances in Con-
stantinople in the presence of Vandals, Sarmatians and men
from Mauritania and Gothland. ‘Vanished nationalities’!
exclaim our opponents. Possibly so. But the individuals of
at least some of those nations had not vanished, or as yet been
absorbed in the new nations. Considering that Carthage was
only finally captured by the Arabs in 698, men from Mauritania,
for instance, who had actually witnessed the fall of Carthage,
might easily have been in Constantinople in the year 727.
The same remark applies to the Vandals. As late as the
ninth century certain Goths in Mcesia (Meso-Goths) kept a
separate existence and spoke Gothic (Zurope in the Middle Ages,
by Thatcher and Schwill, p. 30); nay (¢., p. 29), even to the six-
teenth century, Gothic was spoken by the Goths of the Crimea,
whose ancestors had not been driven out by the Huns. Speaking
strictly of the West, there was a Gothia or Gothland in the south-
east of France in the time of Charlemagne; and so we find
Theodulphus of Orleans, who died about 821, writing (in
Pareenesi ad Judic.) that the Goths of Narbonne claimed him
as a relation. To us, at least, therefore, it appears that the
intrinsic arguments against the genuineness of these two
letters are not of equal weight with the gemera/ arguments
that can be urged in their favour.

INDEX.

——) ew

Assots nullius, 259 n.

Adalbert, heretic, 239, 243.

Adalgis, 405, 433.

Adelperga, 435.

Adeodatus, Pope, 17 f., 19.

Adoptionism, 439.

Afiarta, Paul, 389, gor f.

Agatho (St.), Pope, 24-48.

Aistulf, King, 233, 291, 302 f.,
S0f4e ste 1,,.367.

Alatri, town, 371.

Alcuin, 445, 458, 475.

Aldhelm (st.), abbot, 85.

Alfanus, 208.

Anastasius, Papal Legate, 474 f.

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, 7 f., 9,
212.

Anglo-Saxon Pilgrims to Rome,
148 f.

Annals, 226.

Antipodes, 247.

Antoninus, Patriarch of Grado,
211.

Aquileia, Schism of, 95, 166 f.

Arcarius, Papal Officer, 104.

Arichis, Duke of Beneventum,
428, 433-

Artavasdus, Emperor, 251.

Athelwold, Bishop of Win-
chester, 8.

Ausfred, Bishop of Siena, 274.
Austerfeld, Council of, 34.
Autchar, duke, 298.

Authi, envoy, 354.

BARBIANA, island, 212.

Bede, Venerable, 83.

Benedict Biscop, 24 f., 501 n.

Benedict, of Milan, 139.

Benedict (St.), Pope, 54-63.

Benedict (St.), Body of, 259.

Benedict, of Soracte, historian,
222 nN.

Beneventum, Duke of, 344 f.

Boniface (St.),\.155 f.. 213 f,
asa f.,.322 1.

Brithwald, 82.

CaBinET CycLopepia oF His-
TORY, quoted, 279.

Caedwalla, King, 81.

Calcuith, Council of, 460.

Calistus, Patriarch of Aquileia,
211.

Canterbury, Primacy of, 212.

Cantors, Gallic and Roman,
477 f.

Capracorum, farm colony, 484.

Capua, town, 434.

504

Carloman, King, 234, 254, 302.

Caroline Books, 452 f.

Ceolfrid, abbot, 83, 148.

Charity of Zachary, 274 f.

Charlemagne, King, 405 f.,
422 f., 429 f., 463 f., 472 f.

Charles Martel, 218 f., 224.

Childeric III., King, deposed
by the Franks, 267.

Christoforo, Patriarch of Grado,
96.

Christopher, primicerius of
notaries, 362 f.

Chrodegang, Bishop of Metz,
297 f.

Classis, 171.

Clement, heretic, 240, 243.

Cloveshoe, Council (749), 257.

Ceelian Hill, 17.

Coenred, King of Mercia, 130.

Coins of Hadrian, 486.

Coins of Zachary, 276 f.

Colman (St.), 75.

Conon, Pope, 68-76.

Consiliarius, Papal Officer, 104.

Constans, Emperor, 4 f., 6.

Constantine IV., Pogonatus,
Emperor, 37 f., 41 f.

Constantine, deaconof Syracuse,
73 f.

Constantine, Pope, 127-140.

Constantine V., Copronymus,

251.
Constantine, Antipope, 362 f,
366 f. |
Constantinople, Mock Synod
of, 321.

Corbinian (St.), 152 f.

Corbridge-on-Tyne, Council at,
460.

Cosmas, Bishop of Epiphania,
354.

Cosmas, Emperor, 183.

Cottian Alps, 111 f.

Council, Sixth Ecumenical,
23 4.

Cume, 169.

INDEX

Deacons, Regionary, 103.

Deaconries, 485 f.

Decretum Pontificis, 55.

Defensors, Papal Officers, 103.

Denis (St.), Monastery of, 300.

Desiderius, Duke of Istria and
King, 317 f., 333, 344 f,
376 f., 390 f., 4oo f.

Dialogues, the, of St. Gregory,
es

Dispensator LEcclesiz, Papal
Officer, 103.

Dominicus, Count of Gabellum,
425.

Domus-cultz, 263.

Donation of Charlemagne,
Ato f.

Donation of Constantine, 467.

Donation of Pippin, 301.

Donatus, Patriarch of Grado,
167 f.

Donus, Pope, 20 f.

Droctegang, abbot, 296.

EADBERT, King of Northum-
bria, 340 f.

Ecgwin, Bishop of Worcester,
130 f.

Ecloga of Leo the Iconoclast,

174.
Elipandus, Archbishop of
Toledo, 440 f.
Elvira, Council of, 180.
England, 212, 459.
England and Rome, 340 f.
Ermenbert, Bishop of Bourges,

470°.

Ethelbert of York, 459.

Eudo, Duke of Aquitaine,
165 f.

Eutychius, exarch, 194, 210.

FANTUZZIAN FRAGMENT, 4109 f.

Farfa Abbey, 113, 463.

Farm colonies, 484.

Felix, Archbishop of Ravenna,
128.

INDEX

Felix, Bishop of Urgel, 440 f.
Forthred, abbot, 340.
Frankfort, Council of, 442, 456.
Franks, 302 f.

Fulda, monastery, 250.

Fulrad, abbot, 313.

GALLESE, 216.

Gentilly, Synod of, 355 f.
George, a priest, 205 f.
George, Bishop of Preeneste,

363.
George (St.), finding of head of,
262.

Gerbert, abbot, 352.
Germanus, Patriarch of Con-
stantinople, 148, 195.
Germany, Christianity in, 156 f.
Gisela, daughter of Pippin, 342.
Gisulf, Duke of Beneventum,

107.
Gracilis, tribune, 371.
Grado, Patriarch of, 211, 390.
Gratiosus, chartular, 372.
Greeks, 320 f.
Gregory II., Pope, 142-202.
Gregory II., attempts on life of,
184,
Gregory II. and Gregory I,
likeness between lives of,

144.

Gregory III., Pope, 203-224.
Grifo, Rebellions of, 265.
Grimo, abbot of Corbie, 220.
Grimwald, of Bavaria, 154.

HanprIAN I., Pope, 394-497.
Heathfield or Hatfield, Synod

Of,.:25.
Hildebert, Bishop of Cologne,

323.

Hildeprand, King, 232.

Hilderic III., King, see Chil-
deric III.

Hugbald, 352

ICONOCLASM, 445.
WOME, We Leste 108

33

505

Image Worship, 175 f., 364,
RIOD The

Ina, King of Wessex, 150 f.

Indiculum Pontificis, 56.

Irene, wife of Leo IV., 445 f.

Istria, Duchy of, 417 f.

January, first, pagan observ-
ances of, 235.

John, Bishop of Lappa, 15.

John of Grado, 417, 426 f.

John, Patriarch of Constanti-
nople, 147 f.

John the Silentiary, 293.

John V., Pope, 64--67.

John VI, Pope, 105-108.

John VII., Pope, 109-123.

Justinian II., Emperor, 72 f.,
TESS) Tiny LX).

LATERAN, restoration of, 261.

Lawrence (St.), Basilica of,
326.

Leo, Archdeacon, 376, 4or1 f.,
424 f.

Leo, the Iconoclast, 172 f.

Leo (St.) II., Pope, 49-53.

Leontius, 92.

Letters of Gregory II. to Leo
III., 498.

Leucius (St.), farm colony, 485,

Liftinae, synod, 238.

Liutprand, 198, 216, 227.

Lombard Tuscany, 416.

Lombards, 169, 186, 292, 356f.

Lul, 324.

Macarius, of Antioch, 61.

Maginarius, missus, 435 f.

Mansionarii, Papal Officers, 104.

Maria (S.) Antiqua, Church,
715.

Marinus (priest), 344.

Martel, Charles, 218 f., 224.

Mass, Decree concerning, 201.

Maurice (St.), Monastery of,

20%

506

Maurus, Archbishop of Ravenna,
fe.

Mecitius or Mizizius, elected

emperor, 6,

Medeshampstede, monastery, 7.

Migetius, heresy of, 440.

Minor events of Reign of

Gregory II., 162 f.

Monte Cassino, monastery, re-
stored, 163, 257-

NARNI, 172.

Niczea II., Council of, 450.

Nidd, Synod of, 36.

Nomenclator, Papal Officer,
104.

Nothelm, Archbishop of Can-
terbury, 212 f.

Nympha, estate of, 252.

OpiLto, or Otilo, Duke of
Bavaria, 215, 248, 266.
Offa, son of king of East Saxons,

130.
Offa, King of Mercia, 461.
Officials, Papal, 102 f.
Ordo Romanus, 103.
Oswin, King of Northumbria, 7
Otranto, town, 345.

PaoLuccio ANAFESTI, first Doge
of Venice, 96.

Pascal, 77 f., 80.

Patrician of the Romans, 315 f.

Patrimonies, restoration of,
465 f.

Pavia, town, 407, 422.

Paul (St.) I., Pope, 331-360.
Peada, King of Mercia, 7.
Petasius, 198.

Peter, Duke, 137, 186.

Peter’s pence, 150 n.

Peter’s (St), ‘Church, 210.

Philip, Antipope, 367.

Philippicus, Emperor, 136.

Pilgrims, Anglo-Saxon, to Rome,
148 f.

INDEX

Pippin, King, 224, 271, 295,
302, 311, 342, 346, 349,

357:

Platym, ee

Ponthion, residence of Pippin,
299-

Pyne Ecclesiasticaljurisdiction
of, 14 f.

Popes, Election of, 59, 79, 374-

Popes of seventh century re-
viewed, 99 f.

Popes of eighth century, 491.

Potho, abbot, 463.

QUINISEXT COUNCIL, 87.
Quinisext Decrees, 110 f., 133.

Ratcuis, King, 232, 318.

Ratisbon, Council of, 441.

Ravenna, City, 230.

Reginald, Duke of Clusium, 428.

Reparatus, Archbishop of Ra-
venna, 21.

Rodicausus, monk, 464.

Rome, walls repaired by
Gregory II., 145 ; Council
in (727), 188; (731), 2055
(732), 209; Synod (743),
253; besieged, 305, 309.

Rushforth, Letter of Mr., con-
cerning S. Maria Antiqua,

T15.

SABINE TERRITORY, 430.

Saccellarius, Papal Officer, 103.

S. Silvestro in Capite, church,
339:

Saracens, 164 f.

Sardinia, church in, 66.

Saxewulf, monk, 7.

Schola cantorum, 103.

Segni, 3.

Serenus, Bishop of Forum Juli,
166 f.

Sergius, Archbishopof Ravenna,
$15, 3200.

Sergius I. (St.), Pope, 77-99

INDEX

Sergius, son of Christopher, 366.

Sidonius, priest, 245 n.

Sigebert, monk, 220.

Sinesius, envoy, 354.

Sisinnius, Pope, 124-126.

Socrates, lawyer of Constanti-
nople, 283 f.

Soissons, Synod of (744), 241.

Spiritual relationship, 274.

Spoleto, Duke of, 344 f.

Spoleto, Duchy of, 405.

Stations, ro2 f.

Stephen II., 289.

Stephen III., 290-330.

Stephen (III.) IV., 361-393.

Stephen, notary, 4or.

Subiaco, monastery of, 113.

Sylvester (St.), monastery of,

357:

Tarasius, Imperial Secretary,
446 f.

Tassilo, Duke of Bavaria, 429 f.,
Aga) t.

Tatwine, Archbishop of Canter-
bury, 212.

Temporal Power
276 f., 491.

Terni, city, 228.

Theodicius of Spoleto, 366.

of Popes,

Theodo, Duke of Bavaria,
TSt f.
Theodore, Archbishop of

Ravenna, 46 f.
Theodore, Bishop of Pavia, 274.
Theodore, monk, to f.
Theodore, Patriarch of Con-

stantinople, 21.

507

Theophylact, Patrician, 105.

Thomas II., Patriarch of Con-
stantinople, 4.

Tiber, overflow of, 146 f.

Tilpin, Archbishop of Rheims
478.

Toledo, Fourteenth Council of,
Bz.

Totman, 75.

Toto of Nepi, 362.

Transamund, Duke of Spoleto,
ATO is Age

VENICE, 95 f.
Vicedominus,
104.

Papal Officer,

Vincent (St.), monastery of,

163 f.
Virgiliusand the Antipodes, 247.
Virgilius, priest, 245 n.
Vitalian, Pope, 3, 16.

WalFER, Duke of Aquitaine,

347-
Waldipert, priest, 366 f.
Werner, abbot, 306.

Widman, abbot, 352.
Wighard, 9 f.
Wilfrid (St.), of York, 26 f., 37,

82.

Willibrord, St., 92.
Wulfhere, 7.

York, Archbishopric of, 212.
ZaACARIAS, Captain of Body

Guard, gt.
Zachary, Pope, 226 f.

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Mann, Horace Kinder, 1859-1928.

The lives of the popes in the early middle
ages, by the Rev. Horace K. Mann. 2d ed.
London, K. Paul, Trench, Triibner; St. Louis,
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18 ve inl% fronts., illus., plates, maps (part fold.)
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Contains bibliographies.

Contentse= 1, (in two parts) The popes under the Lombard
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